Ben Solowey helped Noel Coward return to London in style when the
Albery Theatre off on London’s Leicester Square was renamed the Noel Coward Theatre in the Fall of 2006.
Built as the New Theatre in 1903 by Sir Charles Wyndham to house his acting company, a 20 year old Noel Coward had his first play produced in the West End at the theater, I’ll Leave it to You in 1920. While the play was not a hit, it was the beginning of Coward’s illustrious career. In 1924, George Bernard Shaw’s classic St. Joan opened at the theater. In 1930, John Gielgud’s legendary production of Hamlet played there. During the Blitz, it became the home to the Old Vic and Sadler’s Wells Theatre Companies which stayed there until 1950 when their theaters were rebuilt. Perhaps the best known show to premiere at the theater was the musical Oliver!, which ran for 2,618 performances and became a hit around the world.
When Cameron Mackintosh took over the theater, he undertook extensive renovations, including refurbishing the interior. To commemorate Coward’s long standing partnership with Gertrude Lawrence, Mackintosh acquired a lithograph of Ben’s wonderful 1937 portrait of Coward and Lawrence in Tonight at 8:30.
Ben drew Coward four years earlier with Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne in Design for Living.
Should you see the current production of Avenue Q on your next trip to London, stop by and view the portrait.
