My Fair Lady (1964)

Based on the musical (with book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by Frederick Loewe), which in turn was based on the play Pygmaelion by George Bernard Shaw, this musical film is a delight for audiences young and old, and certainly stands the test of time.

Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) is living on the streets in turn-of-the-century (the 20th century, that is) London. One night, while selling flowers outside the theatre, her voice is overheard by linguist Professor Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison). He suggests that her station in life is in direct relation to the way she speaks, and that if she were taught to speak ‘properly’, she could give herself a much better life and a much better job.

This exchange is also overheard by a Colonel Pickering (Wilfrid Hyde-White), who sets Higgins a challenge, in fact, a wager: turn Eliza into a lady.

Eliza is keen at first, taken by Higgins’s promise that she could find a better job. But the training is hard, and Higgins is so obtuse, it quickly becomes almost too difficult for her to take.

I won’t go into any more detail than that here, I’ll leave it to you to find out for yourself.

The screenplay for this film was written by Lerner, who as you will recall, wrote the book and lyrics to the stage musical. This ensures that the adaptation itself is virtually flawless, with the only noticeable difference between stage musical and film being the use of actual locations; when the trio go to the races at Ascot, they are actually at Ascot, not simply on a stage dressed to look like Ascot, for instance.

The cast are all brilliant in their respective roles, in particular Hepburn and Harrison. Rex Harrison actually premiered the role on Broadway, so of course, it stands to reason he would be able to pull it off here as well. The role of Eliza on Broadway was originally played by Julie Andrews, but filmmakers didn’t believe she could play the role on film (bear in mind, this preceded both The Sound of Music and Mary Poppins, so Julie Andrews was only known as a stage actor at this point). However, Audrey Hepburn’s singing voice was overdubbed with Julie Andrews’s voice, as they didn’t think that Audrey Hepburn could sing. (Another note: if you have this film on DVD, the Special Features include scenes where Hepburn is singing, and to be honest, it isn’t that bad).

Another cast member who had played the same role on Broadway is Stanley Holloway, who plays Eliza’s father Alfred P. Doolittle, a brilliant comic character who has a couple of brilliant comic songs to go along with his character. Likewise, his performance is very good, as it is a role he is well and truly comfortable in by the time this film adaptation came along.

The production design and costume design are both beautiful, transporting us back to the early 1900s so effectively.

Director George Cukor has made a fabulous adaptation of a fabulous musical. There is so much to enjoy about this film, the songs, the dialogue, the interplay between characters, and of course, the great satire (most of which actually comes from Shaw’s play). The very fact that the stage musical is still performed around the world regularly today – including several Broadway revivals – is testament to the fact that the material is still popular.

See where it all began (as much as is possible without seeing the original Broadway performance) by watching this, or by watching it again if you have seen it before.

8 out of 10.