Drawing on public and private collections from Europe and the U.S., "Star Quality" will run March 12-June 9, 2012, in the Donald and Mary Oenslager Gallery. The NYPL and the Noël Coward Foundation will unite for the venture — an expanded presentation that promises the most comprehensive exhibit of Coward memorabilia to date.
"Star Quality" was also seen at Ten Chimneys in Wisconsin, followed by London's National Theatre, San Francisco's Museum of Performance & Design and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles.
The exhibit will cull material from Coward's homes in Switzerland and Jamaica, and will include photographs, programs, scripts, costumes, personal effects, memorabilia, as well as audio and video. Never-before-seen memorabilia is also promised.
Coward's plays Present Laughter and Blithe Spirit and the Coward-inspired Brief Encounter (borrowing from his film of the same name and the one-act Still Life) were seen on Broadway in the past two seasons. A Broadway revival of his play Private Lives is in the works for late 2011.