Pygmalion: A Brand New BBC Radio 4 Drama Plus the Story of the Play's Scandalous Opening Night

"Pygmalion", as we all know, is the basis for the musical "My Fair Lady." The problem is that, lately, both "Pygmalion" and "My Fair Lady" have fallen victim to "political correctness." One look no further than Bartlett Sher's smug, cold, calculated, misguided, mis-cast, and mis-directed 2018 Lincoln Center revival of "My Fair Lady" to see how dreary and deadly that is. Director Emma Harding restores balance and perspective in this invigorating production of "Pygmalion" by the BBC. First and foremost, Harding remembers that George Bernard Shaw wrote "Pygmalion" as a comedy: an astringent, often scathing social satire of the British social class system. It can even be labeled as "a comedy of bad manners": and the character with the bad manners is snobby Professor Henry Higgins (Alistair McGowan), who tutors the "lower class" flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Morgana Robinson) to become a "society lady." The perspective and balance are achieved by Harding's inspired casting of multi-talented actors who can play both comedy and drama. The wit and grit of the play remain successfully intact. "Pygmalion" is once again lively, engrossing, and entertaining, instead of cold, dreary, and pretentious. Gone is the cold and cruel aura of entitlement from Rex Harrison that stained the character of Henry Higgins for so long that the interpretation became common-place. Alistair McGowan plays Higgins as a 40-something schoolboy. He is impulsive and arrogant, while simultaneously being ignorant and childish. Higgins has more than a thing or two to learn from Eliza. The excellent Morgana Robinson is especially sassy, spirited, strong, and self-aware as Eliza. Al Murray is a hoot as Eliza's hard-drinking dad Alfred Doolittle, who grabs an opportunity for himself out of Eliza's "social advancement." Sian Phillips (from the BBC's unforgettable classic "I, Claudius") as Henry's compassionate and wise mother Mrs. Higgins, perfectly sums up the careless attitude that Higgins and his colleague Colonel Pickering (Hugh Fraser) have towards Eliza when she says, "You two are a pair of pretty babies, playing with your live doll." The BBC production also includes scenes of Eliza's bath shortly after her arrival at Higgins' apartment, Eliza's lessons (yes, she says "The Rain In Spain"...), and Eliza at the garden-party Ball, all of which add extra dimension to the characters and plot. And, in a clever insider's nod to the musical version, in the short scene where Freddy waits outside for Eliza, Tom Forrester drowsily hums a few bars of "On The Street Where You Live" from "My Fair Lady." Alistair McGowan returns as George Bernard Shaw in the short bonus play "The B Word" (on CD 3). "The B Word" is about the controversy caused when Eliza says, "Not Bloody Likely!!" in "Pygmalion."