My Fair Lady (1964) Facts
| Director(s) | George Cukor |
| Producer(s) | Jack L. Warner |
| Featured Cast | Audrey Hepburn, Rex Harrison, Stanley Holloway, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Gladys Cooper |
| Total Facts | 75 |
Most of Audrey Hepburn's singing was dubbed by Marni Nixon, despite Hepburn's lengthy vocal preparation for the role. A dubber was required because Eliza Doolittle's songs were not transposed down to accommodate Audrey Hepburn's "low-mezzo voice" (as Marni Nixon referred to it), the way Guenevere's songs were transposed down to accommodate Vanessa Redgrave's limited vocal range in 'Camelot (1967)'.
Audrey Hepburn sang most of "Just You Wait", as well as the reprise to the song, herself, showcasing her ability to sing perfectly at ease when the songs were set in a reasonable tessitura. Audrey also sang one or two lines, elsewhere in the score, such as 'Sleep, sleep, I couldn't sleep tonight!' in "I Could Have Danced All Night".
Thus, the claim that Marni Nixon dubbed all of Audrey Hepburn's singing (as asserted by such people as syndicated columnist Hedda Hopper), is false.
Most roadshow film presentations made at that time had an overture recorded especially for the film, meant to be heard while the lights in the theater were still up and the movie screen curtains were still closed. Then, at the end of the overture, the lights would go down and the film would start with what was known as its Main Title music. The overture to the stage version of "My Fair Lady" was longer than the film's opening credits, but Lerner and Loewe apparently still wanted to use it. So, rather than using the typical roadshow format of Overture and Main Title music to get around this, the filmmakers shot the film so that half of the Overture is heard against shots of flowers appearing on the screen; then halfway through the Overture, the lights go down and the opening credits begin.
Musical theater writers Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II had attempted to adapt George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion" as a musical long before Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, but had abandoned the project as unadaptable. Rodgers and Hammerstein felt that Shaw's style of writing intellectual dialog and the emotionless character of Henry Higgins did not lend themselves to a musical. Lerner and Lowe overcame these problems by leaving Shaw's dialogue largely intact, and working under the notion that Higgins must be played by a great actor, not a great singer. Thus, they wrote the role especially for Rex Harrison, and adopted the idea that Higgins should not sing outright, but talk on pitch, less an expression of emotions than ideas.
On average, Rex Harrison would nail his vocal performance of each song on the first take.
One of only 4 productions to win the Best Play Tony (1957) and the Best Picture Oscar (1964). The other 3 are The Sound of Music (1960/1965), A Man for All Seasons (1962/1966) and Amadeus (1981/1984).
Production designer Gene Allen was never given a budget to work from. He just designed and had built all the sets without having to worry about how much they cost.
The 1994 restoration by Robert A. Harris used a variety of methods to return the film to its original condition. The opening credits were digitally re-created using pieces of surviving frames. A few shots were digitally restored by scanning the 65mm negative or separation masters and output back to VistaVision (and enlarged back to 65mm). Some shots were simply re-composited via separation masters. Despite this, most of the film was able to be restored directly from the camera negative. For the sound, only the six-track magnetic print master (used to add sound to 70mm prints) survived. This was digitally restored and used to create a new six-track mix (faithful to the original version), as well as new Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 mixes for modern sound systems.
The American Marni Nixon had to practice a Cockney accent before she could dub all of Audrey Hepburn's singing in the movie.
The movie was advertised as the most eagerly anticipated production since Gone with the Wind.
The musical was to have been called "Lady Liza", but Rex Harrison refused to countenance a title based on the name of the female lead.
The only surviving audio element from the film is the production master, which is actually one generation down from the original recording.
The original Broadway production of "My Fair Lady" opened at the Mark Hellinger Theater in New York on March 15, 1956, and ran for 2717 performances, which was, at the time, the longest run a Broadway show had ever had. To date (April 2009), the original production is still the eighteenth-longest-running production in Broadway history. Rex Harrison and Stanley Holloway recreated their roles in the movie. Harrison won the 1957 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical and Hollaway was nominated for Best Featured Actor in a Musical. The show won the 1957 Tony Award (New York City) for the Best Musical.
The original Broadway production of "Pygmalion" on which "My Fair Lady" was based opened at the Park Theater opening October 12, 1914, ran for 72 performances and was revived in 1927, 1938, 1945, 1987 and 2007. The play premiered in a German translation at the Hofburg Theatre in Vienna on October 16, 1913 and in English at His Majesty's Theatre in London on April 11, 1914 and starred Mrs. Patrick Campbell.
The original choice to direct the film was Vincente Minnelli but when his salary demands were too high, the job went to George Cukor.
The play had first been staged on Broadway in March 1956, and opened in London in 1958. A clause in the contract stated that the film version could not be made until the play had finished in September 1962.
The role of Eliza Doolittle was originally played on Broadway by Julie Andrews. However, she was denied the role because the film's producers didn't think she was "known" enough as a film actress. Many felt that this snub as well as Audrey Hepburn's singing being dubbed led to Hepburn's not being nominated for the Best Actress Oscar nomination.
The story takes place in 1912.
The title is derived from saying "Mayfair Lady" in a cockney accent.
The title of the film appears nowhere in the dialogue nor any of the song lyrics.
U.S. television viewers had something of a Rex Harrison film-fest on Thanksgiving Week, 1973. Doctor Dolittle aired on Thanksgiving Eve on ABC-TV, followed by My Fair Lady on NBC-TV on Thanksgiving Day. This was the U.S. commercial TV premiere of both films, and was probably not a coincidence.
When Audrey Hepburn was first informed that her voice wasn't strong enough and that she would have to be dubbed, she walked out. She returned the next day and - in a typically graceful Hepburn gesture - apologized to everybody for her "wicked behavior".
When Rex Harrison accepted his Academy Award for My Fair Lady, he dedicated it to his "two fair ladies", Audrey Hepburn and Julie Andrews both who had played Eliza Doolittle with him.
When asked why he turned down the role of Henry Higgins, Cary Grant remarked that his original manner of speaking was much closer to Eliza Dolittle.
When Eliza Dolittle demands to see what Henry Higgins has been writing about her, in the beginning of the film, he shows her his notebook, which she cannot read. The notation in the notebook is "Visible Speech", a phonetic notation invented by Alexander Melville Bell (father of Alexander Graham Bell) and extended and used heavily by Henry Sweet, a real-life phonetician and apparently the basis of the Henry Higgins character.
While the movie received generally favorable reviews, critics were divided on Audrey Hepburn's performance as Eliza. While some were critical of the fact that she was dubbed, others such as esteemed British dramatist Sir 'John Gielgud' went on record as saying that Audrey Hepburn was "better than Julie Andrews!" in the role.