My Fair Lady
Overview
My Fair Lady is a musical based upon George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...

's Pygmalion
Pygmalion (play)
Pygmalion: A Romance in Five Acts is a play by Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw. Professor of phonetics Henry Higgins makes a bet that he can train a bedraggled Cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, to pass for a duchess at an ambassador's garden party by teaching her to assume a veneer of...

and with book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre for both the stage and on film...

 and music by Frederick Loewe. The story concerns Eliza Doolittle, a Cockney
Cockney
The term Cockney has both geographical and linguistic associations. Geographically and culturally, it often refers to working class Londoners, particularly those in the East End...

 flower girl who takes speech lessons from professor Henry Higgins, a phoneticist
Phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that comprises the study of the sounds of human speech, or—in the case of sign languages—the equivalent aspects of sign. It is concerned with the physical properties of speech sounds or signs : their physiological production, acoustic properties, auditory...

, in order that she may pass as a proper lady.

The musical's 1956 Broadway production was a hit, setting what was then the record for the longest run of any major musical theater production in history.
Quotations

I could have danced all night, I could have danced all night, and still have begged for more. I could have spread my wings and done a thousand things I've never done before.

Eliza Doolittle, "I Could Have Danced All Night"

Women are irrational, that's all there is to that! Their heads are full of cotton, hay, and rags. They're nothing but exasperating, irritating, vacillating, calculating, agitating, maddening and infuriating hags!

Professor Henry Higgins, "A Hymn to Him"

Her smiles, her frowns, her ups, her downs are second nature to me now, like breathing out and breathing in.

Professor Henry Higgins, "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face"

There even are places where English completely disappears. In America, they haven't used it for years!

Professor Henry Higgins, "Why Can't the English?"

I have often walked down this street before; But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before. All at once am I Several stories high, Knowing I'm on the street where you live.

Freddy Einsford-Hill, "On the Street Where You Live"

Art and music will thrive without you. Somehow Keats will survive without you. And there still will be rain on that plain down in Spain, even that will remain without you. I can do without you!"

Eliza Doolittle, "Without You"

All I want is a room somewhere, Far away from the cold night air. With one enormous chair, Aow, wouldn't it be loverly?

Eliza Doolittle, "Wouldn't it be Loverly?"

Come on, Dover! Move your bloomin' arse!

I ain't done nothin' wrong by speaking to the gentleman. I've a right to sell flowers if I keep off the curb. I'm a respectable girl: so help me, I never spoke to him 'cept so far as to buy a flower off me.

The difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she is treated.

 
x
OK