My Own Fair Lady
2022; Philosophy Documentation Center; Volume: 26; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/nhr.2022.0051
ISSN1534-5815
Autores Tópico(s)Theater, Performance, and Music History
ResumoMy Own Fair Lady Jim Murphy (bio) october 1957. For Mom's birthday, we have somehow gotten tickets to see My Fair Lady on Broadway. The play is the talk of the town, its songs on the Hit Parade, even a dance scene on the Ed Sullivan Show. For Christmas we bought the album, so we all know some of its tunes, but that is no match for going to see it on Broadway itself, a first for both of us. Mom and I have traveled the subway before for Christmas shopping in downtown Brooklyn, but never to Manhattan on a mission like this one. "Mom, did you go to plays in Ireland?" "Not a one. There was a circus that pitched a tent outside of town every summer, and that was great fun, but not a real play. No, no plays in Ballyhaunis. Jimmy, to be honest, I think my first was your Christmas play in grade school, remember that?" "Sure do, Mom. I was a nervous shepherd. I do remember that." "Well, who knows, maybe you'll be an actor someday." I'm thinking, to be an actor, wouldn't it be loverly—to be an actor! In fifth grade it was exciting to be on a stage in St. Jerome's School, but my role as a shepherd in a Christmas play doesn't match this. No speaking part for a shepherd, although I was right there in the closing chorus of "Silent Night," singing away along with the Magi, the Angels, the whole cast, except for the sleeping Baby Jesus doll, who didn't join in as we sang him off to sleep. Amateur stuff. Tonight, it'll be real theater. Broadway! It's magic; even on the subway heading to Manhattan, we can feel it. "Do you think we'll see Julie Andrews?" "I hope so, Mom." At Forty-Second Street we emerge from the subway into the neon glare of [End Page 129] Times Square, a place neither of us has ever seen except for the New Year's Eve TV show. Now here it is, pulsing with light and noise, so near and yet so far from our usual Brooklyn world. Pure magic, and we'll see My Fair Lady, the real thing. We join the crowd, feel the energy, hold our breaths, and wait for our tickets to be OK'd. No problem. In we go—ushers sending us up, up, and up again. We're way ahead of the crowd, which is still mainly standing around on Fifty-First Street. We're near the roof, but from our seats the whole theater opens beneath us. Mom is thrilled to see the massive chandelier right there staring back at us. "Jimmy, this is a great seat. Look, we can see everything. The hoi polloi down below don't even bother to look up at this lovely chandelier, so that's their loss. Can you imagine? Nice to be looking down on them, I must say. Things work out in strange ways, and here we are, high above them all. And look at the ceiling: paintings on the ceiling, can you imagine? As they say at home, God is good in His own way. Here we are in the best seats in the house. Just loverly—they'll be singing that for us tonight. I love that tune. Wouldn't it be loverly." ________ As the musicians gather in the pit, we watch from our lofty perch as they do what seems a chaotic warm-up, everyone out of tune with each other, not even looking at each other, but Mom can sort through this discord and recognize some of the tunes to come. "Jimmy, that's a bit of 'Get Me to the Church on Time,' and that fella over there with his fiddle is warming up for 'A Little Bit of Luck.' God, it's magic how they do all this, paying no attention to each other. Look at them down there, like they don't even know each other. God, great seats." Then the house lights dim, the packed theater quiets, the lights come up, and out of nowhere it...
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