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Desert Island Discs
Presented by Roy Plomley
Playwright, actor, and composer best known for his comedies such as Private Lives and Blithe Spirit, as well as the musical Bittersweet.
Eight records
The keepsakes
No book or luxury recorded for this episode.
In conversation
Presenter asks
Mr. Coward, you were a professional actor as a child, and before that you entertained at amateur functions. Was there any one occasion, like a visit to the pantomime, that gave you this early fascination for the theatre?
Oh yes, I used to be taken to the theatre … on my birthday by my mamma … either in the gallery or the pit … ever since I was five … and I used to be taken mostly to musical comedies. I got, I suppose, the theatre bug then.
Presenter asks
How old were you when you made your first professional appearance?
Ten, eleven.
Presenter asks
Do you ever regret that you didn't have a childhood like other children?
Not at all, no. I enjoyed my own childhood very much. Theatrical digs and the lot.
The recording
Timestamps play the recording from that turn
Speaker 1
BBC Sounds, Music, Radio Podcasts. Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. This is the only extract the BBC has of this episode, and for rights reasons, the music is shorter than on the original broadcast. The presenter is Roy Plumley. I hope you enjoy listening.
Presenter
What's your second choice?
Presenter
When somebody loves you, it's no good unless he loves you.
Speaker 3
All the way.
Presenter
Yeah.
Speaker 3
Uh
Presenter
Happy to be near you when you need someone.
Presenter
mister Card, you were a professional actor as a child, and before that you had entertained at amateur functions. Was there any one occasion, a visit to the pantomime, or whatever it may have been, that gave you this early fascination for the theatre?
Presenter
Oh yes, I used to be taken to the theatre.
Presenter
On my birthday by my mamma.
Presenter
Either in the gallery or the pit.
Presenter
Ever since I was five.
Speaker 3
Yeah.
Presenter
And I used to give it taken mostly to musical comedies. I got, I suppose, the theatre bag then.
Presenter
How old were you when you made your first professional appearance?
Presenter
Ten, eleven.
Presenter
You do come from a musical family. Musical family? It has nothing to do with the theatre. Do you ever regret that you didn't have a childhood like other children? Not at all, no. I enjoyed my own childhood very much. Theatrical digs and the lot. Theatrical digs and the lot, yes. Had you the same early fascination with words? Wh when did you start writing? I started writing.
Presenter
I was about twelve or thirteen, I think.
Presenter
What? Lyrics? Plays? No, I wrote plays.
Speaker 1
Yeah.
Presenter
I wrote some splendid plays, now I come to think of it. I've rather forgotten them. They're all very, very short. Yes.
Presenter
And by the age of twenty two or twenty three, you were a star playing in your own plays. Now about fifty of your plays have been produced. Which are your personal favorites? Awfully difficult question to answer because they
Presenter
are so very different.
Presenter
Private Lives, obviously, was one of my favorites because it was an enormous success and I liked playing it, and I wrote it for Gertie and me, and that was that.
Presenter
Hay Fever I think is a very good comedy.
Presenter
Blythe Spirit technically I think is the best comedy I've ever wrote. I say technically advisedly because it is
Presenter
Instinctively,
Presenter
I did not plan it. It happened like that.
Presenter
And of course, musically speaking, I suppose I love bittersweet better than anything else I've done from the point of view of musicals. Let's have record number three now.
Speaker 3
I'm
Speaker 3
Light behind you
Speaker 3
Who to the dream of dreams?
Speaker 3
As I draw near you, you smile a little smile for a
Speaker 3
We shall stand.
Presenter
In recent years you've spent a lot of time working away from the theatre, in in Cabaret, for example. Do you enjoy Cabaret Entertaining or do you look on it as a profitable sideline?
Presenter
That should be done. Oh no, I n I enjoyed it then. I don't know whether I enjoyed for a long period of time.
Presenter
I loved appearing at the Café de Paris. It was very exciting.
Presenter
And I very much enjoyed appearing in Las Vegas. I think I was largely prejudiced by the fact that I was a success.
Presenter
I think that if I wasn't a success, I shouldn't enjoy it very much.
Presenter
What about films? There's a memorable In Which We Serve which you wrote and directed and starred in during the war, but apart from that you you seem merely to have have dabbled in films, playing the odd part occasionally, like Our Man in Havana. Yes, I like playing um uh supporting parts.
Presenter
Have youone ever thought of doing an original film musical?
Presenter
Yes, I've thought of it. And then I've swiftly wiped the thought from my mind because of the work involved. I really don't think that I could do it. There are other things I want to do more. Now, you wrote, to my mind, the most entertaining theatrical biography ever written, Present Indicative, which covered your life up to about 1931, I think, Carolade. And when the second volume appeared, Future Indefinite,
Speaker 1
Can't you get
Presenter
It merely covered the war years. When are we going to be given the story of those missing years in the 17th century? Well, you see, not only those missing years, those eight years from 1931 until 1939.
Speaker 1
Well
Presenter
But they're all the years since the war. Oh, I'm I'm uh making notes.
Presenter
That will happen eventually. I've
Presenter
I've been keeping a journal for the last twenty years. So I've got quite a lot to um
Presenter
Pick on the foreseeable future, you think.
Presenter
Not all that foreseeable, thank God. Let's have record number four now.
Speaker 3
What money are.
Presenter
Mr. Carter, what do you think of the so-called Kitchen Sink School? John Osborne, Arnold Wesker, Harold Pinter? I think that Harold Pinter is a very.
Presenter
extraordinary and original writer.
Presenter
with immense talent, I think that Wesker is, too.
Presenter
I think that
Presenter
Wes goes trips with everything.
Presenter
is a very, very fine piece of work.
Presenter
I think that when he treats the officer class, he's a little self-conscious and not quite accurate, because I think it is a sort of.
Presenter
hatred going on, which is rather a bore, because it spoils the accuracy of the rest of the play is completely true, I think. Pinter, on the other hand,
Presenter
Is a village?
Presenter
Different.
Presenter
Type of mine.
Presenter
He is using
Presenter
The stage and the English language.
Presenter
in a very fascinating and original manner.
Presenter
And I'm
Presenter
Love in the sea.
Presenter
How he is going to develop in what direction I have seen.
Presenter
is some of his earlier plays that the caretaker,
Presenter
which I think very fine, and the collection, which I was
Presenter
profoundly impressed by it.
Presenter
What about John Osborne?
Presenter
I think his first play that he wrote in collaboration, George Dillon,
Presenter
Had some very good stuff in it, and I think that look back in anger.
Presenter
Vital.
Presenter
And I think it was there was a little bit too much invective.
Presenter
Highly pardonable because it was a very dramatic presentation.
Presenter
His other plays I've not cared for so much.
Presenter
Your last few plays, your own last few plays in London, have had a poor critical reception, but the public have liked them very much indeed. Do you think the critics have been doing a disservice to the theatre lately by going for, shall we say, the the far out plays?
Presenter
Yes, I don't think really all that much a disservice. I think that they've got a bee in their bonnet about
Presenter
The far out plays.
Presenter
And I think that is rather a disservice. But of course, as it as as nobody pays very much attention to them, I don't think it matters. You don't think there's any risk of the critics becoming the the vital factor, as for example, they are in New York? Oh, no, no, no, because the English public think for themselves. The American public do not.
Presenter
Have you any big ambition in your career that's so far unfulfilled? Yes, but it sounds a little.
Presenter
Uh bumpers.
Presenter
I want to go on.
Presenter
Writing.
Presenter
Better.
Presenter
and better and better.
Presenter
And that ought to keep me happily occupied for the next
Presenter
Few years? Yes, I don't think that's in the least bombous. And
Presenter
Are you still stage luck?
Presenter
Wildly staged truck, yes.
Noel Coward
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Noel Coward
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Noel Coward
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Noel Coward
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dim.
Noel Coward
And every fare from fairs sometime declines, By chance or nature's changing course untrimmed
Noel Coward
But thy eternal summer shall not fail
Noel Coward
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest.
Noel Coward
Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade.
Noel Coward
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st
Noel Coward
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see
Noel Coward
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Presenter asks
By the age of twenty-two or twenty-three you were a star playing in your own plays. Which are your personal favorites?
Awfully difficult question to answer because they are so very different … Private Lives, obviously, was one of my favorites because it was an enormous success and I liked playing it, and I wrote it for Gertie and me, and that was that … Hay Fever I think is a very good comedy … Blythe Spirit technically I think is the best comedy I've ever wrote. I say technically advisedly because it is instinctively, I did not plan it. It happened like that … and of course, musically speaking, I suppose I love bittersweet better than anything else I've done from the point of view of musicals.
Presenter asks
In recent years you've spent a lot of time working away from the theatre, in cabaret, for example. Do you enjoy cabaret entertaining or do you look on it as a profitable sideline?
That should be done. Oh no, I enjoyed it … I don't know whether I enjoyed it for a long period of time … I loved appearing at the Café de Paris. It was very exciting … and I very much enjoyed appearing in Las Vegas. I think I was largely prejudiced by the fact that I was a success … I think that if I wasn't a success, I shouldn't enjoy it very much.
Presenter asks
What do you think of the so-called Kitchen Sink School? John Osborne, Arnold Wesker, Harold Pinter?
I think that Harold Pinter is a very extraordinary and original writer … with immense talent, I think that Wesker is, too … I think that Wesker's play The Kitchen is a very, very fine piece of work … I think that when he treats the officer class, he's a little self-conscious and not quite accurate, because I think it is a sort of hatred going on, which is rather a bore … Pinter, on the other hand, is a very different type of mind. He is using the stage and the English language in a very fascinating and original manner … I have seen some of his earlier plays: The Caretaker, which I think very fine, and The Collection, which I was profoundly impressed by … [John Osborne] — I think his first play that he wrote in collaboration, [Epitaph for] George Dillon, had some very good stuff in it, and I think that Look Back in Anger [is] vital … I think there was a little bit too much invective … highly pardonable because it was a very dramatic presentation. His other plays I've not cared for so much.
Presenter asks
Your last few plays in London have had a poor critical reception, but the public have liked them very much indeed. Do you think the critics have been doing a disservice to the theatre lately by going for the far-out plays?
Yes, I don't think really all that much a disservice. I think that they've got a bee in their bonnet about the far out plays … and I think that is rather a disservice. But of course, as nobody pays very much attention to them, I don't think it matters.
Presenter asks
Have you any big ambition in your career that's so far unfulfilled?
Yes, but it sounds a little … pompous … I want to go on writing … better and better and better … and that ought to keep me happily occupied for the next few years.
“I enjoyed my own childhood very much. Theatrical digs and the lot.”
“Blythe Spirit technically I think is the best comedy I've ever wrote. I say technically advisedly because it is instinctively, I did not plan it. It happened like that.”
“I think that if I wasn't a success, I shouldn't enjoy it very much.”
“I want to go on writing … better and better and better … and that ought to keep me happily occupied for the next few years.”