MONMOUTH Music Theatre press pause on political correctness next week at the Savoy Theatre to stage My Fair Lady: a “smashing, positively dashing” Edwardian lark, sure to make you shout “Get me to the theatre on time!”
Holly Thody plays Eliza Doolittle: a Cockney flower-seller who dreams of bettering herself.
When phonetics professor Henry Higgins (Adrian Bevan) boasts to his friend Colonel Pickering (Steve Banner) that he can pass her off as a duchess, Eliza challenges him to put his money where his mouth is for a tempestuous experiment in etiquette.
Eliza’s father Alfred (Haydn Holder) and disreputable buddies Harry and Jamie (Philip Chant and Meriwether Maturin), recognising an opportunity to buy plenty of beer, can’t believe their “little bit of luck.”
As shenanigans ensue, a horse’s backside gains Eliza an adoring stalker in Freddy Eynsford-Hill (Matthew Bryant), a Spanish plain gets soggy, and long-suffering housekeeper Mrs Pearce (Sheryl Westoby) wrangles conversation to the the weather and everybody’s health.
Will the high-society ruse succeed, or will meddling Mrs Higgins (Gay Rogers) and Zoltan Karpathy (Nick Thompson) “do them in?”
Making sure MMT pronounce their vowels is award-winning director Jane Rodgers, musical director Ruth Friend and accompanist/répétiteur Helen Stidolph, whilst co-stage managers Steve Brettle and Adam Wells ensure the church gets to Doolittle on time!
The show runs from Wednesday to Saturday, April 17-20. Tickets priced £16/£14/£10 from the box office or via monmouth-savoy.co.uk