WHAT: My Fair Lady (Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe’s musical, based on George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion and directed by Molly Smith)
WHERE: Fichandler Stage at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater
WHEN: Nov. 2, 2012 to Jan. 6, 2013
TICKETS AND INFORMATION: Call 202-554-9066 (General) or 202-488-3300 (Sales) or check online at http://www.arenastage.org
SPECIAL EVENT: Arena Stage invites members of the armed forces and their families to the second annual Military Thanksgiving Friday, November 23, 2012, with a meal and performance of My Fair Lady.
Eliza Doolittle is 100 years old this year. George Bernard Shaw created the character of the enchanting Cockney flower girl in his incisive social satire Pygmalion in 1912.
Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe would add music and lyrics and bring her to Broadway in 1956.
Now Artistic Director Molly Smith, in a fresh re-interpretation of My Fair Lady, brings Eliza Doolittle to Arena Stage.
How professor of phonetics Henry Higgins wagers he can transform a Cockney flower girl into an aristocratic lady, and is in turn transformed by Eliza Doolittle, is theater magic.
Lerner and Loewe’s sparkling score – including enduring favorites like “I Could Have Danced All Night,” “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly,” “The Rain in Spain,” “On the Street Where You Live” and “Get Me to the Church on Time” – is why My Fair Lady is “the perfect musical.”
Smith’s production set the all-time box office record at the prestigious Shaw Festival in Canada in 2011 and she has reassembled her creative team to bring this breathtaking musical to Arena Stage.
In celebration of this production, Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater is seeking florists to participate in Isn’t She Loverly: Design in Bloom, a costume-inspired floral arrangement contest. The local florists will be paired with a costume worn by a female lead in a past Arena Stage production.
These 25 signature dresses represent a wide variety of eras, regions and styles, including selected costumes from Arena hits (Oklahoma!, Guys and Dolls, Camelot, Ruined, Light in the Piazza, Shakespeare in Hollywood, The Great White Hope and The Women). The costumes and the floral arrangements will be displayed in the Catwalk Café at the Mead Center from November 30-December 2, 2012.
By Sheila Wickouski, a freelance arts and culture journalist and longtime resident of Southwest who has contributed work on history, theater, music, and the arts to area publications for more than twenty years.