Production Details
- Dates: 2nd – 9th April 1979
- Venue: The New College Theatre, Durham
- Director: Fred Wharton
- Musical Director: George Hetherington
Synopsis
The first encounter between Professor Henry Higgins, the brilliant, crotchety, middle-aged bachelor who is England’s leading phoneticist, and Eliza Doolittle, the little cockney gutter sparrow, takes place near the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, late on a cold March night. Eliza is selling violets. Higgins is out on his endless quest for new dialects of London’s speech. A handsome young aristocrat, Freddy Eynsford-Hill, takes no notice of her when she tries to sell him violets. Colonel Pickering, also a linguistic expert, comes to stay with Higgins at his flat. Eliza’s squalid father, Alfred Doolittle, outlines his optimistic if somewhat unorthodox philosophy of life in the rousing With a Little Bit of Luck.
Henry Higgins then goes on to transform 19th-century Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle into a beautiful, swan-like lady – with many great musical numbers along the way!
