My Fair Lady

George Cukor’s adaptation of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe’s celebrated stage musical My Fair Lady (1964) is perhaps the epitome of the big ‘50s and ‘60s Hollywood musicals, and is certainly among the most lasting. Its story has been parodied by innumerable films and TV shows (most notably The Simpsons), many of its songs have become standards, and even its title has entered the public lexicon.

My Fair Lady has everything that one would expect from a Hollywood musical: star casting (at least for the lead), regardless of singing talent, gorgeous art direction, ravishing costumes, and lots of catchy, well-choreographed musical numbers. Overall, however, perhaps due to personal taste, it’s very difficult to take the film as much more than light entertainment; the film takes George Bernard Shaw’s biting social satire and turns it into light romantic fluff crammed with chirpy songs and a contrived happy ending.

The film’s story follows Shaw’s Pygmalion very closely. Arrogant, misogynist linguistics expert Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison) makes a bet with his colleague Colonel Pickering (Wilfrid Hyde-White) that he can change vulgar Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) into a princess for the Embassy Ball. Eliza slowly but surely makes the transformation, but is disgusted when she realizes that Higgins has been using her as a tool for self-aggrandizement rather than for her own benefit. But really, if you don't know at least the general plot, what rock have you been living under?

When released, My Fair Lady was considered “the most anticipated picture since Gone With the Wind”. Stories about the film’s production have become industry legend: the decision to film on sets instead of authentic London locations, the casting of A-list talent Audrey Hepburn as Eliza instead of Broadway star Julie Andrews (then a virtual unknown), and her singing voice being dubbed by Marni Nixon, causing Hepburn to lose her chance at an Oscar bid (to Julie Andrews for Mary Poppins, fittingly enough). The film was a huge box-office smash and won its share of Oscars, and certainly it has been vindicated by forty-five years of continued popularity on video and television. It's hard to deny the film's ongoing appeal as a crowd pleaser, but as a work of cinematic art it's not very satisfying, except on a purely technical basis.

I should admit a personal bias here: I am not a fan of film musicals. On stage, where suspension of disbelief is more easily granted, I don’t have an inherent problem with the genre; but the unforgivably literal and realistic medium of film prevents me from finding most musicals palatable.

Such is the case with My Fair Lady. Many of the film’s songs have become standards, and some of them are quite entertaining in and of themselves (personal favorites include Why Can't the English, Just You Wait, and Show Me), but as part of a film they are more or less distractions. Just when the viewer is getting interested in the story and characters, or savoring the tart Shavian dialogue, we’re transported into yet another five-minute musical number. A viewer more amenable to the musical genre would, to be fair, not have these problems, but that is a bias a freely admit. If I wanted to listen to the music, I would buy the soundtrack album.

The film has other problems lacking in Shaw’s original work, particularly the inflation of the supporting cast. Freddie (future Sherlock Holmes Jeremy Brett) goes from the scattered-brained, leering moron of Shaw’s play (and the 1938 film) to a hopeless, drippy romantic, robbing the film of a much-needed comic edge to Eliza's transformation. On the other hand, Eliza's father Alfred Doolittle (Stanley Holloway), previously a sparsely-used comic relief character victimized by "middle-class morality", is given far too much room to roam, with two lengthy numbers that bring the film to a screeching halt. These two characters are tertiary to the main plot, and yet given an inexplicable amount of screen time, with musical numbers that pad the run time to nigh-unbearable lengths. If any character deserved a rounding out, it's Higgins' beleaguered foil Colonel Pickering, and yet he remains the same passive non-entity as in Shaw.

I honestly wonder if many of those praising My Fair Lady, especially for the story and characters, are familiar with Shaw’s original play. It’s nice that the musical is based on such a great play, but it does not automatically follow that the musical is great. My Fair Lady largely lacks the sharp wit of Shaw’s play, a satire on the social mores and expectations of Victorian Edwardian England; glimmers shine through occasionally, with much of the dialogue admirably intact, but these are mostly smothered underneath gorgeous sets and treacly, interminable musical numbers. Granted, the far-superior 1938 adaptation of Pygmalion has the same "happy" ending with the same hollow clunk at the end (or vice versa), and perhaps it’s less inappropriate for the musical than the straight adaptation, but in every other respect, save maybe Leslie Howard against Rex Harrison and the art direction, Anthony Asquith’s film is by far the superior. Those of not so susceptible to musicals will probably find the previous version more satisfactory, as it manages to maintain the core of Shaw’s work and remain accessible to the average viewer.

One of the primary reasons that My Fair Lady is worth watching for non-musical fans is the absolutely stunning art direction. One forgets to pine for authentic London locations when they cast their eyes on the gorgeous sets of Gene Allen and George James Hopkins, or the unbelievably stunning costumes of Cecil Beaton. From the bustling Covent Garden, to Higgins' cavernous and sterile mansion, to the strikingly beautiful black, white and gray Ascot scene, every set is the very last word in art direction and set design - the entire film is nothing if not a visual treat. All of this is brilliantly captured by Harry Stradling's striking 70mm Technicolor cinematography. If there’s nothing else these musicals offer (and there isn’t much else for most of them), then at least they have glamorous spectacle to commend them - and this is no exception.

Audrey Hepburn’s casting as Eliza is a clear case of sniffing out box office returns, and as much as I love Ms. Hepburn, and however striking a figure she cuts in Beaton's ravishing costumes, it’s hard to say she doesn’t hurt the film. If Hepburn were ten years younger in a straight adaptation of Pygmalion, she would be a perfect Eliza; but a thirty-three year old Hepburn, at the height of her reign as the world’s biggest fashion icon, in a musical where she doesn’t sing her own songs? Hepburn is not remotely convincing as a poor, dirty flower girl (although it must be said her attempts at Cockney are adorable) and thus the audience waits impatiently for her glamorous “coming out” as the star of the Embassy Ball; her obviously dubbed singing is even more distracting. Wendy Hiller’s decidedly unglamorous yet still charming Eliza is by far superior; Hiller is at least convincing as the “gutter snipe” Eliza, rather than a princess waiting for a change in wardrobe. As beautiful, charming and lovely as Hepburn is, she leaves a huge question mark at the center of the film.

Much more satisfactory is Hepburn’s costar Rex Harrison, who unlike Julie Andrews was able to hold over his role from the stage production (though Peter O’Toole and Cary Grant were reportedly considered first). After years of playing him on the West End and Broadway, Harrison is Henry Higgins, charming yet hateful, nasty yet soft-hearted – and Harrison’s customary dry, biting wit makes him a perfect casting choice. He performs his sing-speak soliloquies with the right pitch of sardonic wit, has a surprising amount of spark and chemistry with Hepburn, and overall is absolutely perfect, and overall his Oscar (though against some tough competition - Peter Sellers for Dr. Strangelove and Peter O'Toole and Richard Burton for Becket) is a very well-deserved one.

The supporting cast is a mixed bag. As Eliza’s father, Stanley Holloway is given far too much room to chew scenery and stop the show. I have never particularly cared for Holloway in anything aside from The Lavender Hill Mob (where he has the oh-so-reserved Alec Guinness as a foil), his broad and obnoxious musical-hall comedy being among the few flaws in Brief Encounter, This Happy Breed and other otherwise solid films – and so it is here, with Holloway given lengthy, overwrought musical numbers that slow the film to a snail’s pace. Wilfrid Hyde-White is good enough in the thankless role of Pickering and Theodore Bikel's cameo as Higgins' ex-student Karpathy is amusing, but Jeremy Brett is simply a wet noodle as Freddie. The standout in the supporting cast is undoubtedly Gladys Cooper as Higgins’ exasperated mother, playing the part with the right note of exasperated wit.

Those of you who are likely to enjoy My Fair Lady surely need pay no heed to my harsh words; my biases are here admitted and you're not likely to share them if this is your type of film. To a gentleman like myself, the film's charms are very slight, but its appeal is nothing if not enduring, and My Fair Lady is certainly immune to criticism such as mine.

Rating: 6/10 - Use Your Own Discretion (an 8 or 9 for Musical fans)