Can a “classic” still be relevant?

Yesterday we went to the Sunday matinee performance of “My Fair Lady” at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at the Lincoln Center Theater. We were both quite familiar with the beautiful music and song lyrics of Lerner and Loewe, including “Wouldn’t it be Loverly,” “The Rain in Spain,” “I Could Have Danced All Night,” “On the Street Where You Live,” “Get Me to the Church on Time,” and “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face,” among so many others. Laura Benanti, whom you may have seen recently on her frequent guest appearances as Melania Trump on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, has a fabulous voice and was spectacular as Eliza Doolittle. Here she is singing “I Could Have Danced All Night.”

Mrs. Higgins was played by Rosemary Harris, who had won a Tony Award in 1966 for “A Lion in Winter” and has had a long Broadway career, and received a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement just a few weeks ago.

One of the more interesting aspects of this production is what critics have been referring to as its #MeToo ending.  For those not familiar with the story, it is based upon the George Bernard Shaw play, taken from a Greek myth, “Pygmalion,” in which a sculptor falls in love with one of his works which cames to life. In Shaw’s play, Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics, makes a bet with his friend Colonel Pickering that he can teach a poor uneducated London flower girl with a strong Cockney accent to speak and behave like an upper-class British woman. Throughout the play, Higgins is disdainful of Eliza and treats her quite disrespectfully.

However, Higgins does succeed in teaching Eliza and she attends a royal ball where everyone believes she is upper-class and well educated. In the final portion of the play, Higgins and Pickering celebrate their success while ignoring any role that Eliza herself played in the process. This understandably upsets Eliza, causing her to storm out, but at the very end she returns just after Higgins sings “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face.” 

In the movie, Eliza reappears at Higgins’ home as he is wistfully listening to a recording of her speaking in her old Cockney accent, and you are left with the impression that Higgins and Eliza will marry and live happily ever after. But the original Shaw play did not, in fact, end that way. This production is much more consistent with the original Shaw ending in which Eliza abruptly declares her independence and departs, shocking Higgins but leaving some audience members surprised and others simply delighted.   

To be honest, we had not thought much about the story when we bought those tickets; we were just quite familiar with the wonderful music and lyrics. Admittedly there are a few “cringe-worthy” misogynistic moments in the script, but all in all it was still a most enjoyable experience.

Love,

Rebecca