Noel Coward In Cabaret

Noel Coward worked for British Intelligence, during the Second World War, gathering information. Churchill apparently then told him to go and entertain the troops and so he devised a cabaret act for this purpose, which went down very well and he continued it to great acclaim, afterwards; first at the Cafe de Paris and then in Las Vegas. The critic Kenneth Tynan wrote of the Cafe de Paris act:

"He padded down the celebrated stairs, halted before a microphone on black suede-clad feet, and upraising both hands in a gesture of benediction, set about demonstrating how these things should be done."

It is difficult to think of many modern entertainers who could, alone, hold a sophisticated audience like that for an entire evening and it is good that his plays and (mainly amusing) songs are still being performed.