Mad About the Boy: The Noël Coward Story (2023)

★ 6.4 1h 35m IMDb

The extraordinary life of playwright, singer, actor, composer, and director Noël Coward, who rose from poverty to stardom while keeping his sexuality a secret. Featuring Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Frank Sinatra, Michael Caine and Lucille Ball. Narrated by Alan Cumming. With Rupert Everett as the voice of Noël Coward. Directed by Academy Award Nominee Barnaby Thompson.

Mad About the Boy: The Noël Coward Story

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Cast

Noël Coward
Noël Coward as Self (archive footage) Died 1973 · Teddington, Middlesex, England, UK From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Sir Noël Peirce Coward (16 December 1899 – 26 March 1973) was an English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, and wh...
Rupert Everett
Rupert Everett as Noël Coward (voice) Age 66 · Burnham Deepdale, Norfolk, England, UK Rupert James Hector Everett (born May 29, 1959) is an English actor, director and producer. Everett first came to public attention in 1981 when he was cast in Julian Mitchell's play and subsequent fil...
Alan Cumming
Alan Cumming as Narrator (voice) Age 61 · Aberfeldy, Perthshire, Scotland, UK Alan Cumming (born 27 January 1965) is a Scottish actor, writer and presenter. Known for his roles on stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades, including a BAFTA Award, two Emmy Awards, tw...
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier as Self (archive footage) Died 1989 · Dorking, Surrey, England, UK Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM (22 May 1907 – 11 July 1989) was an English actor and director who, along with his contemporaries Ralph Richardson, Peggy Ashcroft and John Gielgud, dominated...
Maggie Smith
Maggie Smith as Self (archive footage) Died 2024 · Ilford, Essex, England, UK Dame Margaret Natalie Smith CH DBE (December 28, 1934 − September 27, 2024) was a British actress. Known for her wit in comedic roles, she had an extensive career on stage and screen over seven decade...
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter as Self (archive footage) Died 2008 · Hackney, London, England, UK Harold Pinter CH CBE (10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramat...

Audience Reviews

CinemaSerf 7/10 May 24, 2023
This is quite a fascinating documentary. Not because Barnaby Thompson has a particularly innovative approach to the subject matter, but because he has managed to use an enormous amount of contemporaneous archive of this enigmatic man, and because he has engaged the charismatic dulcets of Rupert Everett to, rather authentically, read excerpts from his journals that were written, meticulously, throughout his adult life. Born in relative poverty, Coward lived with his parents whilst his mother slaved away running a boarding house. Like his friend in later life, Charlie Chaplin, you get the feeling that this hand-to-mouth upbringing instilled in this largely uneducated man a determination to succeed. From child acting to writing; the USA, Britain and Jamaica all provided creative conduits as he steadily rose to be the best paid writer in the world. Of course, his life wasn't without it's pitfalls and failures but there is a resilience about the man that this film reinforces time and again. His homosexuality is referenced in the narrative from Alan Cumming but unlike Sir John Gielgud, Coward's complete discretion when it came to that aspect of his life was such that there is little, if anything, to put meat on those particular bones. We just know he was gay, he just never let it define his public persona. The variety and quality of the archive is illustrative of the talents - and of the endearing pomposity - of this creative wordsmith and if you are at all interested in the development of music, theatre, cinema and comedy - aspects of the entertainment industry that this man influenced heavily - then you ought to enjoy it.

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