Readers will recall from my earlier article, I heart P.G.Wodehouse, my account of the efforts taken by my teachers in Malaysia to improve our command of the English language.
Besides encouraging us to read and report on recommended authors, they also arranged for us to go to the cinema. This treat was a very rare one, for parents frowned upon children wasting time in the cinema when they could spend their time with their books.
My teacher had arranged for us to see a re-issue of the classic film "My Fair Lady." It remains to date my favorite film. I know the dialogs and I can sing every song. When I say I can sing, I am stretching the truth. A lot. I can't sing to save my life. What I meant was I know all the words by heart. It is the wittiest, cleverest film that I have ever seen and I would recommend it to anyone. It also introduced me to that great playwright, George Bernard Shaw.
"My Fair Lady" is based on a play by Shaw entitled "Pygmalion." The title of the film is derived from the traditional nursery rhyme, "London Bridge."
"London Bridge is falling down
Falling down, falling down
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair lady..."
"Pygmalion" itself is based on a story by the Roman poet Ovid. Its eponymous hero, a Greek sculptor, sculpts a statue of the perfect woman. His statue is so realistic that he falls in love with her. He prays to the Goddess Aphrodite who pities him and grants his wish. The statue becomes alive, and the woman, called Galatea, marries Pygmalion. They live happily ever after.
In Shaw's "Pygmalion," the hero is Professor Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics. His Galatea is Eliza Doolittle, a Cockney flower-girl.
Shaw's play is a fascinating work on class distinctions in society, the conflicts that arise from them, and the expected behavior within the normative rules of society. It is witty and thought-provoking.
"Pygmalion" was rewritten as an incredibly successful musical called "My Fair Lady," which was then made into my favorite film.
 |  | |  Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison | | | ©2006 Warner Bros | Rex Harrison reprised his stage musical role as Henry Higgins and the gorgeous Audrey Hepburn played Eliza Doolittle. Julie Andrews was the original Eliza Doolittle in the stage musical, but the film bosses overlooked her and handed that role over to Hepburn. Ironically, whilst "My Fair Lady" swept almost all the Oscars, Audrey Hepburn was not nominated at all, and the Oscar for the Best Actress that year went to Andrews for her role as Mary Poppins. Special mention should also be made of Stanley Holloway, who was superb as Alfred Doolittle, Eliza's father, and who won an Oscar that year for the best supporting actor.
The plot in a nutshell is this. Higgins, an arrogant misanthrope, is a professor of phonetics. (Shaw was an ardent advocate of the phonetics system and left money in his will to promote its usage in schools. Unfortunately it never caught on.) He makes a wager that he would be able to transform the Cockney Eliza Doolittle into a high-class lady by teaching her to talk properly and behave impeccably. He succeeds with his wager but along the way he is taught a lesson or two about life by Eliza, who he mockingly calls the "squashed cabbage leaf" and the "guttersnipe."
If there is one word that could aptly describe the film, it is "sumptuous." From the opening scene in London's famous flower market in Covent Garden to the Ascot scene and the grand ball where Eliza is mistaken for a Hungarian princess, it is one breathtaking experience after another. The costumes were designed by Cecil Beaton a famous and talented photographer. His amazing efforts won the Oscar for best costume design.
Harrison was consummate as Higgins. His articulation was superb. Vowels as polished as marbles and syllables enunciated with a crystal clarity made hearing him speak like listening to a spoken symphony. He too won the Oscar for Best Actor. Hepburn was charming and fiesty whereas Holloway was cheeky and endearing. Every part of the film fit well like a jigsaw puzzle.
The songs were wonderful and are popular even now.
Many jazz aficionados would be familiar with "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face" and "On The Street Where You Live," recorded by different jazz artistes. My own favorites are numerous and I am unable to pinpoint any specific one. I love "The Rain in Spain," "I Could Have Danced All Night," and "I'm Getting Married in the Morning" in equal measure.
The wittiest one though is "Why Can't the English?," where Higgins alternatively derides and despairs at his countrymen's inability to speak English properly.
"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?"
Read the play. Watch the film. (Warning: the ending of the film is not the same as the ending in the play. I preferred the film's ending). You will love it like I did.
|
RSS
Del.icio.us
Digg 
reddit
Y! MyWeb
Comments Note: Kindly refrain from personal attacks and profanity.
.jpg)
