Romantic Comedy

Most times when a story (or play, as the case may be) starts with a dark and stormy night, there’s horror coming. Not the case here: with Pygmalion, the dark and stormy night ushers in linguistic hijinks and class commentary.

When two old gentlemen meet in the rain one night at Covent Garden, Professor Higgins, a scientist of phonetics, and Colonel Pickering, a linguist of Indian dialects, the first bets the other that he can, in a matter of months, convince London high society that the cockney speaking Covent Garden flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, has been transformed into a woman as poised and well-spoken as a duchess.

And thus begins the enchanting story that has charmed audiences for over a hundred years.