Wilder writes to Noël Coward About a Most Famous Play

<London>
The Savoy 2:00 a.m.
waiting for a 4:00 a.m.
broadcast. Oct 9-10, 1941

Dear Noel:

            First of all the title is genius:  with spirit and blithe you already lay the ghost and shroud the death’s head.[1]

            And then the whole treatment of Madame Arcati.  What is genius but combining the unexpected and the self-evident, --so that at the same moment you are saying both: “How surprising!” and “How true that is!”

            And what a performance from Miss Rutherford---and then.  Turning it all on Edith. By quarter of four I was saying” How the Hell can Noel get us out of this satisfactorily? And then you did—like that.

            Elvira—perfect. That voice.

            I wish you’d been Charles.

            I thought Fay Compton was hitting pretty hard.

            Tell the director how brilliant his work was.  For instance, that moment when Elvira knows she has caused Ruth’s death. Oooo!

            Only thing I didn’t like was the last three minutes. Hard, I call it.  And a little longueur[1] in the early part of Act II.

            This paly—and London Pride—and the Destroyer picture—falling from one sleeve within two years, and such years[2].  That’s telling ‘em.  That’s England talking.

God bless you            
Thornton

[1] French: length

[2] “London Pride” is a song Coward wrote in 1941.  The “Destroyer picture” refers to In Which We Serve, which Coward wrote, codirected, and acted in.  It was not released until 1942, but the British press had begun discussing the film in late August 1941.