Downhill

Ivor Novello, public school sixth-former, loyally takes the blame when a chum impregnates Mabel, the tuck shop temptress. Cast out of the family circle, he becomes a chorus boy in the West End, inherits some money, marries a gold-digger, goes broke again and works as a taxi dancer-cum-gigolo in Paris. Finally he is (or hallucinates that he is) transported back to London and into the apologetic arms of his family. The author of the source play - 'David L'Estrange' - was a pseudonym for Novello and Constance Collier, and this adaptation abounds in Novello-esque gay motifs: brutish father, voluptuous victimhood, bloody women. It's directed by Hitchcock with imagination and, especially in the first half, much comedy. Essentially though, this should be filed under 'Novello'.