A Fair Lady

By Julie Andrews As told to Barbara Isenberg

I made my debut on Broadway in a show called The Boy Friend in September 1954. My contract ended after a year, but just before I left to go home to England, I received a phone call from a gentleman who said he was the manager for the creative team of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe. He told me that the duo was creating a musical based on George Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion.

That musical was My Fair Lady, and a few months later I found myself winging back to Broadway, at which point my young career very nearly came to a screeching halt. I'd been performing professionally since I was 12 years old, and before I came to America, I must have toured the length and breadth of England many times, playing music halls, doing holiday shows and singing at concerts. Yet other than The Boy Friend, I had never done a book musical, and Eliza Doolittle, the Cockney flower peddler who becomes a lady, is probably one of the greatest and most difficult roles that an actress could tackle.

As we began rehearsals for this wondrous musical, I became acutely and painfully aware that I was hopelessly out of my depth. Every day I became more self-conscious and therefore worse. I knew how to belt out a song and win over an audience, and I think I had a certain gumption that came from all the early experience. I felt that deep down inside I had the ability to play the role if someone would help me.

I was also very intimidated by the leading actor, Rex Harrison. I learned later that Rex had said to our director, Moss Hart, "You either get rid of that kid, or I go," but I didn't know that at the time. Rex was nervous for a very different reason: he had never sung before and didn't think he could. The orchestra was very daunting for him, and so he demanded the most enormous amount of time. I felt left out of the loop. The miracle was that Moss must have seen something in me when I didn't see it in myself. He dismissed the company from rehearsals for a long weekend and said, "I want you to come into the theater, and we're just going to work together on this."

We began with the first scene, and he cajoled, pleaded, bullied and wheedled. He would say things like "No, you're looking like a schoolgirl in this" or "Let him have it. Don't be such a wimp."

My mother and stepfather were in vaudeville, and because I was raised in that environment, I knew you didn't complain. You didn't pull rank, and you didn't have tantrums because it didn't get you anywhere. I knew it was a sink-or-swim situation.

I refer to that long weekend as "the dreaded 48 hours." It's like going to the dentist to have several teeth pulled. You're in agony, and you know you're going to feel better afterward, but the thought of doing it is just terrible. By the end, Moss had created Eliza Doolittle for me, and I had to some degree found her.

At one point during the weekend, Moss went home to his wife Kitty, who asked, "How is she?" and Moss said, "I don't know if she's a little better or I just want her to be better." When it was over, she asked, "What do you think?" and he said something like "Oh, she'll be fine. She has that terrible British strength that makes you wonder why they lost India."

I played in My Fair Lady for 3 1/2 years on Broadway and in London and did more homework on my craft than at any other time in my career. I learned how to preserve my strength and pace myself. And I thank God for Moss Hart. --As told to Barbara Isenberg