The Astonished Heart (film) The Astonished Heart (film) The Astonished Heart is a 1950 British drama film directed by Terence Fisher. It stars Celia Johnson, Noël Coward, and Margaret Leighton, and is based on Coward's play "The Astonished Heart" from his cycle of ten plays, "". Inspired by the great success of the 1945 film "Brief Encounter", which also had been adapted from "Tonight at 8:30", Coward agreed to have "The Astonished Heart" produced as a motion picture. As with the previous film, Coward also wrote the screenplay. Production began in 1949 and featured not only Noël Coward in one of his rare film
Noël Coward and "Our Man In Jamaica" (2007), with Malcolm Sinclair playing Coward in each. On stage, characters based on Coward have included Beverly Carlton in the 1939 Broadway play "The Man Who Came to Dinner". A play about the friendship between Coward and Dietrich, called "Lunch with Marlene", by Chris Burgess, ran at the New End Theatre in 2008. The second act presents a musical revue, including Coward songs such as "Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Germans". Coward was an early admirer of the plays of Harold Pinter and backed Pinter's film version of "The Caretaker" with a £1,000 investment.