"Noël and Gertie' at the Walnut's Independence Studio 3 (2nd review)

Noël Coward was more than he appeared to be.

He achieved a reputation for gossamer flippancy, but he could plumb darker depths.

There's anguish in his work that makes it resonate beyond his time. His 1924 play, The Vortex, was a drama about cocaine addiction. Poignancy pervades his Private Lives, although that play (soon to receive new stagings in New York and Philadelphia) may seem superficial at first glance. And poignancy is the essence of Coward's song, "If Love Were All," in which he describes himself as having only "a talent to amuse."

Noël and Gertie, written in 1981 by Coward's biographer, Sheridan Morley, is a series of reminiscences by Coward and Gertrude Lawrence, for whom Coward wrote some of his best-remembered pieces. It presents scenes from some of Coward's plays and showcases two dozen Coward songs. Theirs was an unequal relationship, Lawrence being a talented performer while Coward was an incandescent performer as well as a creator.

Will Stutts does a carefully accurate imitation of Coward, but his singing voice is weak. Susan Wilder almost steals the show with her fine soprano (better than what we hear on Lawrence's own recordings) and her ebullient personality. Owen Robbins accompanies Stutts and Wilder on the piano and sings briefly but effectively.

Bittersweet scene

Morley's script has pluses and minuses. Dwelling too long on the children's shows where Noël met Gertie is a negative. So is the excessive time devoted to a sailor-suit routine from Red Peppers.

A highlight is a bittersweet scene from Brief Encounter, about a married man and married-with-children woman who hesitantly fall in love after meeting at a commuter train station in London. Their tentative advances and their reluctant continuation of their relationship are heart tugging.

There's appeal in a comic scene from Blithe Spirit, the 1941 Coward play about a deceased and "morally untidy" wife who returns to haunt her re-married husband. (Angela Lansbury starred in a 2009 revival on Broadway.) And the songs are wonderful, especially "I'll See You Again" and "Some Day I'll Find You," which serves as a suitable finale.

Also outstanding is Wilder's singing of "Sail Away," which is not at all a conventional love song. Coward wrote:

"When the storm clouds are riding through a winter sky...
When the love light is fading in your sweetheart's eye...
Sail away."

Meeting Leontyne Price

That was the title-song from the last musical for which Coward wrote words, music and directed. When it tried out at Philadelphia's Forrest Theater in September 1961, I caught an inadvertent close-up glimpse of the great man.

Leontyne Price was singing Aida at the Academy of Music, and I was in Price's dressing room after the final curtain when I heard a buzz among the ushers in the hallway outside: "Noël Coward is here. He's coming!" In those days, Coward was a much bigger celebrity than Price— one of the entertainment world's greatest stars, in fact.

When Coward burst into the tiny dressing room, he dropped to his knee in front of the flabbergasted soprano and kissed her hand. "I adore you, I worship you," he gushed.

Now that was a performance!


♦


To read another review by Jackie Atkins, click here.