Review of My Fair Lady at Pitlochry Festival Theatre

Jun 24 2011 by Alison Anderson, Perthshire Advertiser Friday

PITLOCHRY Festival Theatre’s two previous musicals – ‘Whisky Galore – the Musical!’ in 2009 and ‘Kiss Me, Kate’ last summer – set the bar extremely high, and happily this standard is maintained aplomb with My Fair Lady.

The Alan Jay Lerner/Frederick Loewe colourful classic, adapted from GBS’s Pygmalion, is a fitting flagship production for PFT’s 60th Anniversary Season.

It re-unites the main men behind ‘Kiss Me, Kate’: director John Durnin, set and costume designer Adrian Rees, musical director Jon Beales and choreographer Chris Stuart-Wilson.

Some of the My Fair Lady cast also return to the Pitlochry stage for this season, which is fortunate because Kate Quinnell and Dougal Lee are simply perfect in the lead roles of Eliza Doolittle and Henry Higgins.

My Fair Lady is, of course, the entertaining tale of a Cockney flower girl’s transformation by cold-hearted Professor Higgins, assisted by Colonel Pickering, into the toast of London society. Without doubt, it is one of the greatest musicals of all time.

Unforgettable songs such as Wouldn’t It Be Loverly?, I Could Have Danced All Night, On The Street Where You Live, The Rain in Spain, I’ve Grown Accustomed To Her Face, Get Me To The Church On Time and many others, come thick, fast and oh-so enjoyable.

The 18-strong cast never falter in pace or panache as Henry Higgins’ social experiment goes through its ups and downs. Costumes are simply stunning, and some quirky touches inject a 21st century freshness into this 1956 musical – including the use of snippets of script on the walls inside and outside Higgins’ home.

PFT’s winning formula from its two previous years calls for versatility as cast act, dance, sing and play musical instruments, and there is not a chink of weakness in any of these spheres.

Every colourful character is well cast. Quinnell and Lee top the list of plaudits while other outstanding performances include Darren Machin (Alfred Doolittle), Robin Harvey Edwards (Colonel Pickering) and Sandy Batchelor (Freddy Eynsford-Hill).

Special mention must also go to veteran Perthshire-based actress Clare Richards for her regal bearing as Henry Higgins’ long-suffering mother.

My Fair Lady plays in repertoire until October 15. It’s unlikely that there will be a better production of anything, anywhere in Scotland this summer, so book your tickets now!

Alison Anderson