"Lovemaking is an art which must be studied & practiced."
I love this film & after seeing Robert Altman's brilliant Best Picture nominated film- Gosford Park for the 4th time, I had to explain to a friend that the character of Ivor Novello was not from the imagination of screenwriters Bob Balaban & Mr. Altman. Jeremy Northam's portrayal of the matinee idol was so effortless & elegant that it's easy to believe him to be just another one of Altman's brilliant creations. But Ivor Novello was, in fact, a major & important celebrity in the 1st half of the 20th century, the kind Cole Porter & Noel Coward personified & loved to write about: the smoking jacket wearing, martini drinking, man-about-town, & what a big surprise… Ivor Novello was gay!
He was born David Ivor Davies January 15th, 1893 in Cardiff, Wales.
Ivor Novello did it all, working on the stage to the silent screen in D.W. Griffith's The WhiteRose & the early Hitchcock thriller- The Lodger. He wrote popular plays such as The Rat & movies- Tarzan the Ape Man ("Me Tarzan, you Jane" was the invention of Novello). He gave Vivien Leigh her stage name, & wrote the patriotic song Keep the Home FiresBurning. He was the Andrew Lloyd Webber of the '30s & '40s, composing lush, romantic musicals- like Glamorous Night & Perchance to Dream.
He was as versatile & prolific as his friend & rival Noel Coward. Critics fell all over themselves trying to describe his romantic appeal, which proved to be as powerful to many male theatre & moviegoers as to the legions of Novello's swooning female fans. Coward himself would admit Novello could be "violently glamorous" but also "a little vulgar too”. I think that was the secret of his appeal.
In 1916, Novello met 21 year old actor Robert Andrews. They became lovers & remained together for 35 years. They appeared together in many of Ivor Novello's plays & musicals. Novello bought a house in Jamaica, near Noel Coward’s, where he & Andrews spent time together. They were devoted to each other until Novello’s death & were rarely seen without the other. In 1951, Andrews was with Ivor Novello when he died at their London flat. 10,000+ fans lined the streets of London to say good-bye, & the service was broadcast live. Noel Coward: "Ivor & Bobby are beguiling, but they also ramble on ad nauseam about 1 topic- the month Novello spent in prison in 1944 for misusing wartime petrol coupons. They forever lamented the ‘injustice’ of it all”. On Novello’s passing Coward wrote in his diary: "Another landmark swept away. Poor, poor Bobby…he will be utterly devastated.”
The Ivor Novello Awards have been given annually, since 1956, to British songwriters & music publishers. Past recipients of "Ivors" include Peter Gabriel, Elton John, Sting & Paul McCartney. Last year the fab song The Fear by Lily Allen won for best song.
In an era before there was such a thing as "openly gay," Ivor Novello lived an unapologized for life of authenticity & openness. How great is it that his last play, staged in 1951, would be titled- Gay's the Word?
I don't know why I am doing a mind riff on this song, but I just can't shake it. Mad About The Boy deals with the theme of unrequited love for a film star. It was written to be sung by a female, but Coward also wrote a version with lyrics bent to the risqué topic of homosexual love:
Mad about the boy I know it’s silly But I’m mad about the boy & even Dr Freud cannot explain Those vexing dreams I’ve had about the boy
When I told my wife She said “I never heard such nonsense in my life!” Her lack of sympathy Embarrassed me & made me frankly glad about the boy.
My doctor can’t advise me He’d help me if he could 3 times he’s tried to psychoanalayse me But it’s just no good
People I employ Have the impertinence To call me Myrna Loy I rise above it Frankly love it ‘Cos I’m absolutely Mad about the boy
The song gained new popularity when Dinah Washington's rendition was used in the Levi's television advertisement " The Swimmer", directed by Tarsem Singh. In the commercial, which is homage to the1968 Burt Lancaster film The Swimmer, a young man runs through an American suburban neighborhood stripping down to only his jeans, invades private gardens & dives into a series of swimming pools in order to shrink his jeans. Washington's recording was re-released by Mercury as a tie-in in with the advertising campaign, & the cover art featured a shot of the topless male emerging from a swimming pool & bore the Levi's logo. The single made the Top 50 in the UK singles chart.
Other Notable Cover versions by: Georgia Brown Blossom Dearie Marianne Faithfull Frances Faye Helen Forrest Jackie Gleason Lena Horne Cleo Laine Gertrude Lawrence Beatrice Lillie Julie London Billy May Carmen McRae Anita O'Day Eartha Kitt Elaine Paige < Tom Robinson Dinah Shore Maxine Sullivan Miss Piggy (as Mad About the Frog)
This clip reminds me so much of my own life in the late 1960s. Oh, the parties that I attended! We have Yul Brynner in drag, in The Magic Christian (1969), singing, even better... lip-synching Peter Seller's voice, doing Noël Coward's Mad About The Boy. Can you spot all the celebs in this clip?
I'm mad about the boy I know it's stupid to be mad about the boy I'm so ashamed of it, But must admit the sleepless nights I've had About the boy
On the silverscreen He melts my foolish heart in every single scene Although I'm quite aware that here & there are traces of the cad About the boy
Lord knows I'm not a fool girl, I really shouldn't care Lord knows I'm not a school girl In the fury of her first affair
Will it ever cloy This odd diversity of misery & joy I'm feeling quite insane & young again & all because I'm mad about the boy
Mad about the boy, It's pretty funny But I'm mad about the boy. He has a gay appeal that makes me feel There's maybe something sad about the boy.
If I could employ A little magic that will finally destroy This dream that pains me & enchains me But I can't because I'm mad... I'm mad about the boy!
"Very few people are completely normal really, deep down in their private lives. It all depends on a combination of circumstances. If all the various cosmic thingummys fuse at the same moment, & the right spark is struck, there's no knowing what one mightn't do."
I amnot able to recall why or how, as a youth, that I came to know & understand that Noel Coward was gay. I do know that as I came out to myself at around age 13, I researched everything I could find about homosexuality, & the news was never good. At the public library, all the information & listings included the words “invert” & “perversion”.
I latched onto the idea that Noel Coward would be a fine role model for dealing with the realization that I was gay. He was after all, fabulous, famous, well loved & moved in a circle with the most talented artists of the day. I would read everything by & about him, an avocation that lasts to this day.
I eventually would go on to play Elyot in Private Lives in college. The director of that piece told me recently on Facebook, that I reminded her of “a young Peter O’Toole” at the time we were doing this play. Unfortunately, I would go on to ape many of Mr. O’Toole’s behaviors later in life. I loved doing Private Lives, which I think is a nearly perfect piece of theatre, with not a wasted bit of dialogue or a false moment.
In the summer of 1978, I had the good fortune to play Simon in an amazing, impressive & beautiful production of Hay Fever, which was designed (sets, lights & costumes!) & directed by the man that would eventually become my Husband. The entire cast was dressed in different shades of whites. It was a very happy summer living in Noel Coward’s witty, wicked world, but I was starting to fall in love with my director. Sir Noel Coward has been a major player in my life & helped shaped the man I would become.
Known for his wit & elegance, Noel Coward defined the post-World War I era. Although regarded as a gay icon today, Coward was never open about his homosexuality during his lifetime. Coward had his first sexual experience, with another boy actor, at age 13, but his closest friends were girls, including his lifelong friend, fellow child actor Gertrude Lawrence. By 15, Coward was already a well known actor & had begun writing & composing. He produced & starred in his first full length play- I Leave It To You, at age 21. 4 years later The Vortex, his controversial work about sexual encounters & drug abuse among the upper class, was a smash hit & made the young Noel a celebrity. By his mid-30s Coward had written & produced some of his best known plays, including Hay Fever, Private Lives, & Cavalcade. During the course of his career he wrote more than 50 plays & 300 songs & starred in 25 films. Coward once said that to create successful work, an artist must "consider the public. Coax it, charm it, interest it, shock it now & then if you must, make it laugh, make it cry, make it think, but above all never, never, never bore the living hell out of it."
World War II brought major changes in Coward's life. He briefly worked as an undercover intelligence agent, a job for which he proved to be too well known. He then devoted himself to entertaining troops around the globe. After the war, he continued to write & perform, but his style fell out of favor & his work was criticized as frivolous & outdated.
In the 1950s he became a cabaret performer, achieving popular acclaim in Las Vegas. Escaping England's high taxes, Coward lived in Jamaica & Switzerland. He was friends with many famous artists, including Laurence Olivier, Errol Flynn, Daphne du Maurier, Spencer Tracy, & Katharine Hepburn.
Coward had sexual & romantic relationships with men throughout his life. Jack Wilson, an American stockbroker, was his lover & business manager for a decade beginning in the mid-1920s. After World War II Coward fell in love with South African actor Graham Payne; the pair were together until Coward's death. But Coward was always circumspect about his same sex relationships, as were many other gay men of that era, a time when homosexuality was still illegal in Britain.
Although never publicly adopting a gay identity, Coward sometimes addressed homosexuality metaphorically in his work, which often dealt with hidden longing, society's hypocrisy, & the battle against conventional moral restrictions. Design For Living, depicting a bisexual ménage a trois between 2 men & a woman (starring the famous Alfred Lunt & Lynn Fontaine. Both of whom had same sex affairs), sold out every night of its Broadway run. In 1966 Coward wrote & starred in Song At Twilight, the story of an ageing gay author who fears he will be exposed. This is his only work to deal explicitly with homosexuality.
Coward was knighted by The Queen in 1970. In January 1973 he appeared with longtime friend Marlene Dietrich at a performance of the off-Broadway revue of his work, Oh Coward! It would be his last public appearance; he died at his home in Jamaica in March of that year. In 1984 a memorial stone was unveiled in Westminster Abbey bearing words from one of his songs: "I believe thatsince my life began, the most I've had is just a talent to amuse."
