Best Picture Winner: 1964

My Fair Lady (1964)

A thoroughly delightful musical version of George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion, My Fair Lady is a treat for Audrey Hepburn and musical fans alike. Sumptuously filmed with memorable songs and enthusiastic performances, My Fair Lady is a joy from start to finish.

Professor Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison) is renowned for his book on phonetics. Just by listening to a person speak he can pinpoint from where that person comes. Colonel Pickering (Wilfrid Hyde-White), an expert on Indian dialects, is visiting Higgins when a strange opportunity presents itself. Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn), a Cockney flower girl, wants Higgins to teach her to speak like a lady so she’ll be able to open her own flower shop. Because Higgins has bragged he could pass any woman off as a duchess at an embassy ball, Pickering agrees to pay Eliza’s lesson costs if in fact Higgins can do such a thing with Eliza.

My Fair Lady is a deft blend of humor, song, and dance. Harrison’s stuffy Higgins is such an arrogant, sexist chap (“Why can’t a woman be more like me?”) that he is the film’s de facto villain. But his biting, self-serving soliloquies (“An Ordinary Man,” “A Hymn to Him”) are so witty and humorous that he becomes a character you love to hate. Not surprisingly Eliza starts to warm up this cold fish, even though the film’s final line suggests he could use some more thawing.

Hepburn is perfectly cast as Eliza. Already known for her beauty and classy roles she’s really something to behold when we first encounter Eliza, unkempt and speaking a thick-as-London-fog accent. She mines many laughs as Eliza overplays her plight, wailing at the slightest suggestion she’s not “a good girl.” On the flip side, her enthusiasm is contagious as she sings "I Could Have Danced All Night" after a breakthrough with Higgins. Her improvised monologue at a race track, about how a fictitious aunt was poisoned, is hilarious, as is her exclamation at the end of the race. And of course she’s absolutely stunning in her embassy gown. Hepburn is clearly having fun here, and the audience is behind her every step of the way.

Adding to the fun is Stanley Holloway as is Eliza’s no-good father, Alfred. He hits her up for drinking money when needed and extorts money from Higgins for using Eliza. (Alfred wouldn’t necessarily mind if Higgins intentions were not honorable. Higgins would just have to pay him more.) Alfred’s presence isn’t really necessary, unless it is to explain how Eliza could handle someone like Higgins. But Holloway contributes two of the best numbers in the film: "With A Little Bit of Luck," about how if you’re lucky you might be able to shirk your responsibilities, and “Get Me to The Church on Time," about how, even though a strange twist of fate has pushed him into respectability, he plans on having fun the night before his marriage. Alfred is wonderful in a horrible sort of way.

Other highlights of My Fair Lady include Hyde-White’s charming characterization of Pickering, and Gladys Cooper’s stern take on Higgins mother, which provides some clues on why Henry may have turned out so rigid. This viewer’s favorite song is "On the Street Where You Live", performed by a would-be suitor who waits outside Higgins’ house for a chance to spend time with Eliza. Director George Cuckor stages the musical numbers with verve, with the introduction of the stuffy upper class ("Ascot Gavotte") a particular standout. The gentry are presented in static cuts (instead of the flowing camera moves during other numbers) and are clad in outfits of strictly black, white and gray. It’s a clever visualization of the coldness present in a society based on appearance and convention.

But even the stuffed shirts in My Fair Lady have their good points. And ultimately My Fair Lady is too good natured to foster resentments. Rather the film is a treat for the eyes and ears. My Fair Lady is a great entertainment.