“Mad About the Boy” – Crazy for him too [MOVIE REVIEW]

Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment.

Noel Coward is a name that seems to have dropped from the modern lexicon and that’s entirely unfair. I’d done my fair share of dismissal until I saw a production of “Present Laughter” in London starring Andrew Scott. Now, granted, Scott could read the phone book (if we used such things now) and it would be entrancing, but in the throes of the sophisticated language and situations of Noel Coward, he reached new heights. How was that possible? There was nothing dated about the production or the language. It was that rarest of the rare, a farce that worked seamlessly. I finally understood what theatergoers for decades had understood, beginning in the 1920s. Noel Coward wasn’t a prince among men, he was a king. “Mad About the Boy,” Barnaby Thompson’s delightful documentary will set the record straight on Coward’s genius while filling in the personal details that were so necessary to his formation.

Born into genteel poverty, encouraged by his mother he left school at the ripe old age of 9 to join a children’s theater troupe. And so ends the formal education of Master Coward. Graduating to adolescent and then adult roles, he began to write plays in which he would star. Although his first play was a flop, he continued on this path and by the time he was 20, he had a play produced on the London stage. This was just the first among many. Self taught, he reveled in language. In order to play these roles, because all were written with him as the lead, he had to conquer a stutter, developing a distinctive clipped, almost upper class manner of speaking.

Lawrence Olivier and Noel Coward. Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment.

Coward controlled all aspects of his productions and it is important to note some of his discoveries. John Gielgud was his understudy in an early play; Laurence Olivier was convinced to play the straight man in “Private Lives”  well before he had established himself as a great Shakespearean actor, and David Lean of “Lawrence of Arabia” fame, received his first film directing credit for “In Which We Serve,” one of the most popular and effective films about World II in which Coward starred, wrote the screenplay and score, and co-directed with Lean. 

His inability to read music didn’t stop him from creating some of the most famous songs of his day, among them “Mad Dogs and Englishmen” and “Mad About the Boy.” There was no end to his talent. By the time he died, he had written 60 plays, several of which are still performed today like “Private Lives,” “Hay Fever,” “Design for Living,” “Blithe Spirit” and the aforementioned “Present Laughter.” By the time he was 30, he was the highest paid writer in the world. Most of his plays were performed in London’s West End and on Broadway. 

But even when he was down and out, he found a way to recreate himself. In the 1950s, when his new plays were rejected by the audience as old fashioned and he was in a financial bind, he turned to cabaret, performing his own songs in his own inimitable fashion. An American producer in the audience at the Cafe de Paris in London where he was performing, offered him a boatload of money to take his act to Las Vegas. At the time, the gambling capital was becoming known for attracting top talent into their smaller showrooms. Performers like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Marlene Dietrich and Nat King Cole appeared regularly. Coward was an immediate hit, championed by no less than Frank Sinatra. Yet another rebirth of the man who had already lived multiple lives. 

Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment.

What makes this documentary so engrossing is that it tells Coward’s story in Coward’s own words. The archival clips from the many talk shows on which he appeared are wonderful and hilarious, capturing his unique wit and off-handed bon mots. A gay man when homosexuality was a criminal offense in Great Britain, he still lived life on his own terms, just very discreetly. 

As a youth, his goal was to provide a better life for his mother and he did. He was supremely loyal to his friends, foremost among them was his cohort from his child acting troupe, Gertrude Lawrence. Lawrence may be a now-forgotten name but she was one of the greatest theater actors of her day, starring in the original production of “The King and I,” and opposite Coward in his hit “Private Lives,” in which Olivier played her cuckolded husband.

“Mad About the Boy” is a must see. It fills in gaps you didn’t know existed and does it with humor, music and intelligence. I am, quite frankly, mad about the boy. He’s not old fashioned; he’s the very modern model of a major talent in general (apologies to “The Pirates of Penzance”) who wrote plays, movies (one of which garnered him an Oscar) and music and acted or sang most of them. I think you too will be a fan.

Streaming October 11 on VOD platforms.