Product Details

• Actors: Audrey Hepburn, Rex Harrison
• Format: Color, DVD, Original recording remastered, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: G (General Audience)
• Studio: Paramount
• DVD Release Date: October 6, 2009
• Run Time: 172 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B002HK9IDQ
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #657 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

At one time the longest-running Broadway musical, My Fair Lady was adapted by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe from the George Bernard Shaw comedy Pygmalion. Outside Covent Garden on a rainy evening in 1912, dishevelled cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) meets linguistic expert Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison). After delivering a musical tirade against "verbal class distinction," Higgins tells his companion Colonel Pickering (Wilfred Hyde-White) that, within six months, he could transform Eliza into a proper lady, simply by teaching her proper English. The next morning, face and hands freshly scrubbed, Eliza presents herself on Higgins' doorstep, offering to pay him to teach her to be a lady. "It's almost irresistable," clucks Higgins. "She's so deliciously low. So horribly dirty." He turns his mission into a sporting proposition, making a bet with Pickering that he can accomplish his six-month miracle to turn Eliza into a lady. This is one of the all-time great movie musicals, featuring classic songs and the legendary performances of Harrison, repeating his stage role after Cary Grant wisely turned down the movie job, and Stanley Holloway as Eliza's dustman father. Julie Andrews originated the role of Eliza on Broadway but producer Jack Warner felt that Andrews, at the time unknown beyond Broadway, wasn't bankable; Hepburn's singing was dubbed by Marni Nixon, who also dubbed Natalie Wood in West Side Story (1961). Andrews instead made Mary Poppins, for which she was given the Best Actress Oscar, beating out Hepburn. The movie, however, won Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor for Harrison, and five other Oscars, and it remains one of the all-time best movie musicals.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars What posesses Hollywood?, December 6, 2009

By	Don Elarton (Iowa) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

What possesses Hollywood to palm off inferior products on an unsuspecting public? This new DVD released 10/6/09 is not a wise buy. Notice in the product description of this Paramount/CBS DVD release no mention is made of the sound. That's because it doesn't have Dolby 5.1, but instead some hokey stereo track of much inferior quality. Likewise, and contrary to the product descriptions online, the original aspect ratio of 2.20:1 has been cut to 16:9 as stated on the DVD sleeve.

If you love My Fair Lady as much as I do consider purchasing either of the Warner Home Video releases which are available new online through Amazon at moderate prices. The first Warner release was issued 12/08/98 and reputedly has the best picture. The second Warner release was a deluxe two-DVD set with expanded special features well worth watching. The quality of both picture and sound on this deluxe set is also far superior to the newly released CBS DVD version. Both Warner versions have the original aspect ratio and Dolby 5.1

Why does Hollywood issue inferior products like this? And to ad insult to injury their doing a remake of My Fair Lady to be released in 2010. I'd call that a "must miss."

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars MY FAIR LADY, November 21, 2009

By	R. Kendrick "Dog Haven" (Georgia, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

This was my late husband's very favorite movie. My video of
My Fair Lady was lost, and I was so glad to find it now on DVD.
It provides many hours of entertainment and enjoyment.

11 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars loverly new "Fair Lady" release, August 24, 2009

By	Byron Kolln (the corner where Broadway meets Hollywood) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

This is Paramount's first chance to release MY FAIR LADY on DVD; following a lapse in the distribution/copyright formerly controlled by Warner Brothers. No doubt they'll later include it in an Audrey Hepburn box-set with their other Hepburn titles ("Roman Holiday", "Funny Face" and "Sabrina" among them).

MY FAIR LADY is a true cinema classic; one of the last major Hollywood musicals and the film which finally netted director George Cukor a belated Academy Award for 'Best Director'. Based on the long-running Broadway musical and G.B. Shaw's "Pygmalion", the story follows the grooming of Cockney flower-seller Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) into a lady of refinement by linguistics professor Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison). These two opposites could hardly be more different, until the day that Higgins admits he's "grown accustomed to her face"...

With a star-studded supporting cast (Wilfred Hyde-White, Jeremy Brett, Gladys Cooper and Stanley Holloway chief among them) and the soaring score of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, MY FAIR LADY is the glittering jewel which capped off the era of the great Hollywood musicals. Seldom again would audiences be treated to such a sumptuous spectacle on the screen.

Despite a huge critical backlash (concerning Julie Andrews not cementing her most acclaimed stage role on film), Audrey Hepburn gives a spirited performance as feisty Eliza. She worked hard to get her limited singing voice into the necessary shape to meet the demands of the score, yet at the 11th hour was replaced by noted Hollywood "ghost singer" Marni Nixon. Rex Harrison, having starred in both the Broadway and London productions of the show, was confident enough in his performance to sing his songs live (via a hidden microphone). Stanley Holloway--another veteran of the stage show--also triumphantly reprises his role for the screen.

Warner's previous double-disc Special Edition release (using the 1997 restored print of the film) was quite definitive. I can't imagine how Paramount is going to top that release--unless they perform a new remaster of the 1997 print. Still, MY FAIR LADY is one of those movies which deserves to always be in circulation, constantly enjoyed and discovered by new audiences. I can only hope a shiny new Blu-ray release is just around the corner...

EXTRA FEATURES:
* Audio commentary with restoration experts Robert Harris and James Katz, art director Gene Allen, and singer Marni Nixon
* Vintage featurettes, footage and audio
* Alternate Audrey Hepburn vocals
* poster and lobby card galleries (with Rex Harrison radio interview)
* "Comments On A Lady"
* trailers