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Eliza and Henry, again
My Fair Lady, the classic show that brought music to George Bernard Shaw's play, opens at the Show Palace Dinner Theater.
By BARBARA L. FREDRICKSEN, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published October 3, 2002
[Times photo:
Janel Schroeder-Norton]
Meredith Inglesby, left, plays Eliza Doolittle and Bobb James is her father, Alfred, in the Show Palace production of My Fair Lady.
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HUDSON -- After some of the biggest names in Broadway musicals turned down the chance to create a show based on George Bernard Shaw's 1914 play, Pygmalion, the team of Frederick Loewe and Alan Jay Lerner agreed to do it in 1956. Good thing.
Their show, My Fair Lady, retains much of Shaw's dialogue and is true to his social commentary, especially in the songs Why Can't the English?, Without You and in the streetwise Alfred Doolittle's slyly mocking observations about "the undeserving poor."
Though musical adaptations of other books and plays fell by the wayside, the Lerner and Loewe musical became an instant classic, running for years on Broadway, produced by countless touring companies, regional theaters and community groups, and winning six Academy Awards as a movie.
The Show Palace Dinner Theatre opens its version of this favorite Friday for a seven-week run.
Director Bruce Blaine brings back some of the Show Palace's top performers to be in the 23-member cast. Playing Eliza Doolittle, the Cockney flower girl turned into a proper lady by arrogant elocutionist Henry Higgins, is Meredith Inglesby, who played Polly Baker in the Palace's Crazy for You in January. Doing Higgins, Eliza's teacher and tormentor, is Jerry Gulledge, who played Don Quixote in the theater's Man of La Mancha last season.
The cast also has Bob Wells (Polly's dad in Crazy for You) as Col. Pickering; Bobb James (Governor in La Mancha) as Alfred Doolittle; Barbara Wells (Mrs. Child in Crazy for You) as Higgins' indulgent but exasperated mum; Matthew McGee (Hysterium in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum) as Karpathy, and in the ensemble, Laura Lynn Tapper (Sugar in Some Like It Hot), Sara DelBeato (Doatsey Mae in Best Little Whorehouse in Texas), Susan Haldeman (Nettie in Carousel, Domina in Forum) and Troy LaFon (La Cage aux Folles, La Mancha, Some Like It Hot).
The show also has Jaeb Theatre veterans Stan Collins leading the musicians and John Leggio doing the choreography.
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PREVIEW: My Fair Lady runs Friday through Nov. 17 at the Show Palace Dinner Theatre, 16128 U.S. 19, Hudson. Shows are at 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays, and starting Oct. 23, 1:30 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays and some Saturdays. Doors open two hours before each show for double buffet and full-service cash bar. Dinner and show, $37.50; show only, $26.45. Ages 12 and younger, $19.95 and $14.95. Call (727) 863-7949 or toll-free 1-888-655-7469.
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