My Fair Lady: SE

Despite two major flaws, this is a musical masterpiece which will endure as long as cinema itself. This is, after all, the fairest Lady of them all... My Fair Lady.

In Australia many years ago, the stage-recording of My Fair Lady was banned. People desperately sought the Broadway stage recording featuring Rex Harrison and the original 'Lady', Julie Andrews. But it was banned from sale in this country, in a strange circumstance reminiscent of the present sales ban on Region 1 and 2 DVDs.

The reason was much the same - selfish copyright owners simply did not feel Australians should be able to listen to the music before the copyright owners were ready to place a production of the musical onto Australian theatre stages.

When the record was finally made available for sale here, it was like a dam being breached. Australia just exploded with the lyrics and music of Lerner and Lowe. The stage version was hailed by all. And on its release in 1964, the movie generated the same level of special excitement. It was strange then that its owner, Warner Brothers, allowed this eight-fold Oscar winner to almost crumble away in its vaults, to be saved only after a last-ditch million-dollar restoration effort headed by noted film restorer Robert A. Harris.

This classic movie is one of the handful of musicals which define the genre, ranking alongside Oklahoma, Singin' in the Rain and Annie Get Your Gun. It immortalises the wondrous way Lerner and Loewe captured the very essence of George Bernard Shaw's original Pygmalion or, to be more specific, how it captured the essence of the 1938 UK movie version of that play, with its screenplay by Shaw and direction by Anthony Asquith and Leslie Howard.

It's worth watching My Fair Lady after viewing that 1938 movie. The resemblance between Leslie Howard's Professor Higgins and Rex Harrison's portrayal is so strong that you expect Leslie Howard to burst into song at each and every cue. That's not taking anything away from Rex Harrison's portrayal, it's just fascinating lineage.

Rex Harrison is the movie's chief glory, and it was virtually a crime that Audrey Hepburn received top-billing instead. Warner didn't initially want Harrison in the role; matinee idols such as Rock Hudson were mentioned instead. Rock Hudson, it's reported, rocked with laughter when he heard his name proposed. He lent his own weight to the argument that Rex Harrison be allowed to immortalise on film the role he'd made legendary on stage. But, and this is the movie's chief flaw, the studio turned its back on the original Eliza, Julie Andrews. They decided she just wasn't photogenic, so it was nice vindication that in that year's Oscars celebration, she picked up 'Best Actress' for her 'consolation prize' lead role in Mary Poppins.

Audrey Hepburn looked as beautiful as only she could. But she simply could not sing, even though she was desperate to do her own vocals. The two outtakes included in this disc, of Audrey doing her own vocals for Wouldn't it Be Loverly and Show Me, demonstrate just how disastrous a movie My Fair Lady would have been, if that course had been followed. Her voice was instead dubbed by Hollywood's most professional of 'voice-over' vocalists, Marni Nixon. And though hers is an excellent voice, her voice-overs simply are not dramatically convincing. The only way voice-overs could have succeeded would have been if Warners had somehow got Julie Andrews to agree to doing voice-overs for Audrey!

But despite this flaw, the film is nothing short of marvellous. It's great to have Rex Harrison doing his famous 'singspiel' versions of the famous songs. This irascible misogynist was played to perfection by Rex - all other performances ever since have been measured against his.

Audrey Hepburn, though 'second-best' casting, is certainly wondrously beautiful in this movie, and is set off to perfection by the most inspired of Cecil Beaton's wardrobe designs.

Wilfred Hyde-White gives affectionately solid support as Higgins' friend Pickering, and Stanley Holloway is... well, he simply IS Eliza's dustman-father Alfred Doolittle.

And to round out generally strong casting, Jeremy Brett (later to achieve fame as a perfect Sherlock Holmes in a long-running television series) is the consummate foppish upper-class layabout-round-town, Freddie Eynsford-Hill.

Cecil Beaton's set and costume designs are amongst the greatest ever created for cinema. And it's nice to realise that the cinematographer on this 1964 production, Harry Stradling, was in fact also cinematographer for the classic 1938 Pygmalion. Musical values are paramount - and this production was under the musical helm of one of Hollywood's legendary figures, Andre Previn.

All in all, this is long (165-minutes), but always a memorable film-realisation of one of the glories of the musical stage.

This new transfer is very similar to the earlier DVD version; the meticulously restored film has been transferred with fine fidelity to DVD.

If you're seeking only a fine copy of the movie, are not interested in extra-features and already own the previous DVD version of My Fair Lady, then there's very little to be gained by owning this special-edition; the glory of this new set is in its special-feature additions.

I mentioned at the start of this review that this DVD was marred by two flaws. The first (which couldn't be corrected for DVD issue) was the producers' insistence on dumping Julie Andrews in favour of Audrey Hepburn for the role of Eliza.

The second flaw is found in this DVD issue alone, and it could have been corrected.

Warners have a habit of issuing some of its movies for Australia in NTSC format. For My Fair Lady they've opted instead for PAL.

That might give a very slight improvement in picture resolution. But that's at the expense of a significant degradation in sound. The movie runs approximately four per cent faster in PAL compared to NTSC, and the musical pitch rises proportionately.

I played the Region 4 PAL and the Region 1 NTSC versions of My Fair Lady simultaneously on two DVD players, switching between their audio channels for instant comparison. And where the NTSC version has the proper weighting and gravitas, our Region 4 PAL version sounds, because of the speed-up, high-pitched and nasally.

I guess Warners is in a no-win situation here. They attract flak for releasing DVDs here in NTSC format. But I believe they should persevere with that practice when the movie carries a significant musical content. Otherwise, they should, along with other PAL regions, plough some money into developing a flawless digital process which allows preservation and playback of the soundtrack at its proper pitch.

Apart from that major quibble, it's good to report that the digitally-processed Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound is strong and detailed, with a great natural-sounding presence. The optional one-channel French and Italian soundtracks lack that quality of course, but are decent-sounding and interesting as curiosities.

The first disc carries one of the major extra features, an audio commentary by art director Gene Allen, singer Marni Nixon (voice-dubber for Audrey Hepburn) and film restorers Robert A. Harris and James C. Katz. This is a meaty voice-over, full of fascinating material about the making and the saving of the movie.

First up on Disc Two is a carry-over from the previous DVD edition, the hour-long documentary More Lovely than Ever: My Fair Lady Then and Now, hosted by Jeremy Brett and featuring archival footage of the movie's production, plus some great demonstrations of the film before and after restoration. This well illustrates Robert A. Harris's credo that it's not enough to just digitally restore a movie for DVD release; the first step must be proper restoration and preservation of the film itself.

To prove just why Audrey wasn't allowed to sing in the movie, we have two numbers, Wouldn't It Be Loverly and Show Me, where her own vocal efforts are preserved. These are worthwhile curiosities, but certainly prove that she was no Fair Lady vocally.

There is a bizarre 23-minute black-and-white film of a 1963 production kick-off dinner to let the press meet the cast. The first few minutes are silent; then it switches to sound for some badly conducted media interviews with Audrey Hepburn, Rex Harrison and Jack Warner, which show clearly why so many people treat the press with disdain. Film condition is poor; it's badly cut, but is full of precious vignettes.

Then we have two featurettes of special (especially boring!) people of the film and musical world. First up is Martin Scorsese, talking about film preservation and the establishment of the Film Foundation. He may be a fine director, but that's where his talent ends... as shown in his disastrous recent 'personal view' television series about Italian cinema.

Next up is even worse - it's 'composer' Andrew Lloyd (Porky) Webber, talking about his collaboration with wordsmith Alan Jay Lerner on The Phantom of the Opera. Pity he didn't talk instead about from where and whom he 'borrows' his themes for his excruciatingly bad musicals, that would have been more useful.

There is footage of Rex Harrison in absentia accepting the Golden Globe award for 'Best Actor', and footage of Jack Warner accepting the Oscar for 'Best Picture'.

The 'Show Me' galleries are pretty boring small-frame photographs and sketches collected under four headings: Sketches, B&W Production Stills, Colour Production Stills and Documents and Publicity. These photo-gallery presentations aren't worth doing unless done well; these are low-resolution images of negligible value and interest.

Fiinally, we have original theatre trailers presented in good condition for the 1964 original release, and for the splendid 1994 restored 30th Anniversary presentation. It's that 1994 restoration which we now have on DVD - My Fair Lady preserved forever in her original pristine condition.

My Fair Lady should be in everyone's collection. And the only thing which might deter some collectors from grabbing this edition would be the decision to issue it in PAL instead of NTSC, with the corresponding problem in the audio pitch.

Of the musicals I mentioned earlier as being pacesetters in this genre, all are also available in Australia in worthwhile editions, except the original movie version of Oklahoma!, which is still available only in Region 1. There was a local release here of that movie in a pan-and-scan version, but that hardly counts! Get them all.