Pygmalion and My Fair Lady
My Fair Lady
My Fair Lady was produced for American audiences on Broadway in 1956, 43 years after Shaw's production of Pygmalion opened in Europe.
Although several other attempts to produce a remake of Pygmalion had failed, My Fair Lady was a critical and audience success. It was written and produced by the dynamic duo Alan Jay Lerner, a notable play writer and lyricist, and Frederick Lowe, a well-known composer.
Read through a summary of each scene below. Listen to or watch the clips to get a sense of how the musical might be different from the play you have already read.
Act 1
Scene 1
Why Can't the English?
Professor Henry Higgins meets Eliza Doolittle, a flower girl with a strong cockney accent, in Covent Garden. He mocks her way of speaking and laments that the English people don't teach their children to speak properly. After he leaves, Eliza wonders what it would be like to live a life like the professor, imagining herself in a comfortable situation.
Look below for a piece of Higgins' song, "Why Can't the English," which he sings after meeting Eliza. You can also listen to the whole song above.
[PICKERING, spoken]
Oh come, sir, I think you picked a poor example
[HIGGINS]
Did I?
Hear them down in Soho square
Dropping "h's" everywhere
Speaking English anyway they like
You sir, did you go to school?
[MAN]
Wadaya tike me for, a fool?
[HIGGINS]
No one taught him 'take' instead of 'tike'
Hear a Yorkshireman, or worse
Hear a Cornishman converse
I'd rather hear a choir singing flat
Chickens cackling in a barn
Just like this one
[ELIZA, spoken]
Garn
[HIGGINS, spoken]
Garn
I ask you, sir, what sort of word is that?(sung)
It's "Aaoooww" and "Garn" that keep her in her place
Not her wretched clothes and dirty face
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
This verbal class distinction, by now
Should be antique
If you spoke as she does, sir
Instead of the way you do
Why, you might be selling flowers, too
[PICKERING, spoken]
I beg your pardon, sir
[HIGGINS]
An Englishman's way of speaking absolutely classifies him
The moment he talks he makes some other Englishman despise him
One common language I'm afraid we'll never get
Oh, why can't the English learn to
Set a good example to people whose
English is painful to your ears?
The Scots and the Irish leave you close to tears
There even are places where English completely disappears
(spoken)
In America, they haven't used it for yearsAct 1
Scene 2
How to learn English pronunciation with My Fair Lady (1964)
Eliza decides to approach the professor and ask for speech lessons. Higgins bets his friend, Colonel Pickering, that he can make her sound like a duchess in 6 months.
They begin speech lessons, but they do not always go smoothly. Higgins lacks compassion for Eliza and often mocks her or gets frustrated with her lack of progress. The two often argue, and Eliza even has a song titled "Just You Wait," in which she imagines killing him when she is done with their lessons.
You can watch the above clip from the 1964 film adaptation to get a sense of how the lessons go in the play.
Act 1
Scene 3
Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady
One day, after Eliza gets her speech in a lesson perfect, Higgins takes her to the horse races to try out her manners and diction. She forgets herself while watching the race and begins shouting at the jockeys and horses in her typical cockney accent. This horrifies Higgins, but a boy named Freddy falls in love with her for it.
After more lessons, Eliza attends the Embassy Ball as her final test. She is believed to be a Hungarian princess by a Hungarian phonetician and dances all night long, fooling everyone.
In the above clip, you can see how Eliza does at the embassy ball. What differences do you notice between this clip and the same scene in Pygmalion? Any similarities?
Act 2
Upon returning home from the ball, Higgins and Pickering congratulate themselves on a job well done, ignoring Eliza. Eliza gets so angry that she decides to leave and runs into Freddy, who declares he loves her.
The two wander back to Covent Garden, but Eliza now feels out of place there. Eliza also sees her father, who has come into some money thanks to a generous American and is about to marry his girlfriend.
When Higgins wakes up, he can't imagine what happened to make Eliza mad. His lack of consideration causes Pickering to leave out of frustration finally. Higgins then heads to his mother's house but, instead of sympathy, finds Eliza, who tells him that she no longer needs him.
Higgins returns home, realizing that he misses Eliza, singing a song called "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face." At the very end of the play, Eliza appears in his home. The two do not share any romantic moments in the stage and movie versions. Instead, Higgins seems satisfied and asks Eliza to find his slippers as she walks toward him.
You can get a sense of how Higgins feels in the last scene by reading his song lyrics below. He sings this alone on stage, which means he is revealing his true thoughts.
HIGGINS
Her smiles, her frowns,
Her ups, her downs
Are second nature to me now;
Like breathing out and breathing in.
I was serenely independent and content before we met;
Surely I could always be that way again-
And yet
I've grown accustomed to her look;
Accustomed to her voice;
Accustomed to her face.
[Spoken]
"Marry Freddy." What an infantile idea. What a heartless,
wicked, brainless thing to do. But she'll regret, she'll
regret it. It's doomed before they even take the vow!...
[Spoken]
"Marry Freddy"-h a!
[Sung]
But I'm so used to hear her say
"Good morning" ev'ry day.
Her joys, her woes,
Her highs, her lows,
Are second nature to me now;
Like breathing out and breathing in.
I'm very grateful she's a woman
And so easy to forget;
Rather like a habit
One can always break-
And yet,
I've grown accustomed to the trace
Of something in the air;
Accustomed to her face.
Pygmalion vs. My Fair Lady
A lot of the two shows are identical, including the character names, the basic plot, and much of the dialogue. Click through the boxes below to explore some similarities and differences.
Characters
While the characters are roughly the same between Pygmalion and My Fair Lady, a few changes were made.
Eliza: In Pygmalion, Eliza is sweet-natured. While occasionally feisty, she doesn't find her voice until the end when she stands up to Higgins. She often runs out of the room crying in Pygmalion. In My Fair Lady, Eliza is more of a comedic character; her mistakes are played for laughs. She is still likable and sweet but more argumentative from the beginning.
Higgins: In both shows, Higgins is a master of dialects who wants to teach Eliza to speak "proper" English to win a bet. In both, he is oblivious to Eliza's needs, especially as a woman, and is focused on his own goal. He comes across as more unkind during the lessons in My Fair Lady, partially because Pygmalion mostly skips over them. In Pygmalion, he uses harsher words to describe Eliza, and in My Fair Lady, his last song seems to clearly reveal that he loves her, whereas, in Pygmalion, his feelings remain vague.
Plot
The plot of both shows is very similar. A few key differences include Eliza's appearance at the horse race, rather than Mrs. Higgins's living room, and some of the song revealing characters' inner thoughts on stage. In contrast, they can be more of a mystery in Pygmalion.
Themes
While reading Pygmalion, we looked at the following theme ideas:
Appearance vs. Heart
Science vs. Humanity
Upper vs. Lower Class / Societal Expectations
Re-creation
In My Fair Lady, each of these is touched on, as well, but in less intentional ways, as the writers of the American musical wanted to play up the romance and drama for their audiences. The theme of Science vs. Humanity is mostly lost in American production, while the theme of Societal Expectations is highlighted.
Changes for Modern Times
In Shaw's original idea for Pygmalion, he intended the ending to include Eliza sweeping out and leaving Higgins alone on stage. When the play was first performed, the actor playing Higgins stayed on stage for a moment, exchanging a look with Eliza as she left, which allowed the audience to hope that the two might stay together and even begin a romance.
Shaw intended the play to address social issues, such as inequality and society's treatment of women. However, audiences have often clung more to the vague ideas of romance in the play.
In 1938, Shaw wrote a screenplay for Pygmalion. However, the director wrote in his own ending, which included a romantic return from Eliza. The 1956 American version played up this theme, as well.
Why do you think the stage versions of this play highlight the romance? In what ways does it seem to fit the American musical audience?