News that My Fair Lady is coming to the Grand Opera House in York, arrives as the Government announces details of university entrants for this year. It is still as difficult as ever it was for someone from an inner city comprehensive school to gain entry to Oxford or Cambridge.
One interesting detail, however, is that more people than ever before are the first member of their family to enter Higher Education. It seems that not only are we becoming more highly educated as a nation, but there is no longer a limit placed on what we ourselves are able to achieve as Eliza Doolittle, the heroine of both Lerner & Loewe’s musical My Fair Lady and George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion on which it is based, finds out for herself.
Given the opportunity to change her situation, Eliza washes her hands and face. She dreams to have a job in a flower shop or be a lady’s maid. Unfortunately, Professor Higgins, the Svengali-like figure under whose influence she falls, has other ideas. He wagers to be able to pass her off as a Duchess at a society ball.
In the original play Bernard Shaw pokes fun at the snobbery of the British class system by trying to show that the things which the upper classes thought made them special, – knowing which piece of cutlery to use, for example – can be learned by anyone. These rules of society control entry to its upper echelons and the behaviour of those who have been granted entry. Tellingly, the original Broadway poster designed by Al Hirschfeld portrayed Shaw as a puppeteer controlling Henry Higgins who is pulling the strings that control Eliza Doolittle.
The road to creating a successful musical out of Pygmalion was not so easily achieved. Shaw was uncomfortable with the idea of his play being converted into a musical and it was not until after the writer’s death that the film producer Gabriel Pascal started looking for lyricists and composers to work on the project.
Rodgers & Hammerstein, tried but failed. It was left to Lerner and Loewe to complete the job. Even then, they took two years before they started to write anything, creating extra scenes to fill the gaps between acts in Shaw’s play.
What they came up with is undoubtedly my favourite musical – or, to be more accurate, my favourite film musical. I can watch it again and again. My Fair Lady has everything that a musical should have: excitement, glamour and the fear that no matter how many times I see it, there might not be a happy ending.
This Pick Me Up Theatre production of My Fair Lady uses costumes from the Crucible production which featured Dominic West as Professor Higgins. Directed by Robert Readman, the cast includes Toni Feetenby as Eliza, previously having appeared in Betty Blue Eyes and Into The Woods. Rory Mulvihill plays Higgins. The actor began his career as a solicitor before reinventing himself Eliza Doolottle like. With a strong supporting cast, the production is bound to be a hit.
Oh, wouldn’t it be luvverly if those teenagers who went to university this year – the first member of their families to do so – take heart from Eliza and those who fought to bring her story to the musical stage? You have to work hard to achieve your ambitions.
My Fair Lady is at The Grand Opera House in York from 20 – 25 November. Details here.