Cast

Synopsis

Professor Higgins studies phonetics and for a wager takes up Eliza Doolittle from the gutter to turn her into a lady. The ensuing events are well known and Shaw’s pithy dialogue is, of course, masterly.

Directors Notes

Pygmalion is Shaw’s most successful and popular play. It was an instant hit, even though the first production in 1914 had to survive the tempestuous relationship of Shaw and the play’s two stars, Mrs. Patrick Campbell and Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree. In the decades that followed, Shaw’s tale of a young flower girl turned “duchess” through the exertions of a phonographic expert achieved widespread circulation through revivals, adaptations and film. As an audience we delight in the constant flow of verbal wit and Eliza’s vitality pitched against Higgins’ determination to remain personally unchanged by his relationship with her. Before the play opened all London knew was that Eliza was scripted to cry out “not bloody likely!” and for a time it wasn’t clear as to whether it would be produced. The Daily Sketch speculated on the forbidden word. “Will Mrs. Patrick Campbell speak it? Has the censor stepped in, or will the word spread?” It was denounced by preachers, politicians and by a genuine flower girl the Daily Express took to the play and then bribed with several pints of milk stout to say that the language was shocking. Laughter on the first night was timed at 75 seconds and the moment passed into theatre history.