THE PLAY IS NOT REALLY THE THING IN NEW NOEL COWARD BIOGRAPHY.(LIFE & LEISURE)

Byline: CLIFFORD A RIDLEY

In 1921, having recently entered his maturity (he was born 18 days before the new century), Noel Coward set sail for the first time from London to New York. A rising young actor, playwright and man about town, he had heard from a fellow actor about the incandescent jangle of Times Square. As he would later recall in ``Present Indicative,'' the first of his two autobiographies, ``its gigantic sky-signs dazzled my dreams, flashing . . . with unfailing regularity, the two words `Noel Coward.' ''

Born in South London to working-class parents, Coward had made his professional acting debut at the age of 11, and the recent opening of his comedy ``I'll Leave It to You'' had occasioned a newspaper profile that observed ``the narrow slant of his …