Free Loverly:The Life and Times of My Fair Lady (Broadway Legacies) by Dominic McHugh

wedding becomes a focal point. Upon discovering Eliza has fled, Higgins traces her to her father’s wedding; the gathering of the significantly “Middle Class” guests outside the church is a way of illustrating Doolittle’s social mobility; Doolittle blames Higgins for his new circumstances to his face (as in
Pygmalion
) rather than via Eliza (as in
Fair Lady
); there is no scene at Mrs. Higgins’s house (the argument takes place outside the church instead); and Eliza leaves “triumphantly” with Freddy after her argument with Higgins, rather than departing alone and reappearing at Higgins’s house in the final scene. The ending, however, seems to have been conceived as the proper conclusion for the musical all along, hinting that Lerner always saw the close of the
Pygmalion
movie as his preferred ending to the piece.
    Like Outline 1, Outline 2 portrays romance between Higgins and Eliza in a different way than in the published show. Suddenly, Eliza’s feelings seem to matter: Pickering says that “she’s perfectly equipped now to find a job in a flower shop,” indicating a concern with her future that is not portrayed in the final show, and he “maintains it isn’t fair to Liza to allow her to go through with [the bet].” Higgins agrees with this, apparently mirroring Pickering’s compassion and common sense, and then is secretly “delighted” when she decides to go on, indicating how emotionally bound up with her he is (though the experiment is unquestionably a huge motivator here too, of course). A significant difference between Outlines 1 and 2 is that whereas the first indicates that Eliza “requests Higgins’ arm,” this second outline merely has thethree “departing for the ball.” Ultimately, Lerner would reinstate the gesture with the arm and give it huge significance.
    The outline of act 2 continues the overall trend toward overt discussions of love. We see, for instance, the crucial inclusion of a duet for Higgins and Eliza—something missing from the final show, and yet something that would have united them in music in a classic gesture of romance. Pickering’s character is strikingly at odds with his
Fair Lady
persona: he is “amused” at Higgins’s behavior, intimating that the motivation for the Professor’s irritability is romantic jealousy. He reprises his first-act song and “facetiously suggests to Higgins that he try it again with another flower girl—create another woman precisely to his own taste,” whereupon Higgins “stomps off” and Pickering “laughs.” This outline also reveals initial plans for the ball scene: whereas the definitive show ends the first act in the middle of the dance and tantalizes us with Eliza’s fate until “You Did It” at the start of act 2, Outline 2 shows the events in real time. “You Did It,” of course, is a great showcase for Higgins and Pickering in which they relate the evening’s events to Mrs. Pearce and the servants, but Outline 2 has all this happen onstage instead, and even includes reference to Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody in the same ironic way that Loewe would eventually evoke it in “You Did It.” The third scene of act 2 is also unfamiliar, in the sense that it depicts the trio in a “period limousine” with Pickering driving, but Higgins self-satisfied behavior is familiar from both
Pygmalion
and the published
Fair Lady
.
Outline 3: Scenic Outline (ca.1954)
    Outline 3 (reproduced in table 3.4 ) also comes from Herman Levin’s papers. It gives less specific information about the action, has no mention of songs, no title or date, and takes up only three pages. However, the outline does show a mixture of some scenes held over from the previous outline and some advanced to the familiar scenario, implying it must be an intermediate version. Act 1, scene 9 contains a note: “I am hoping that by the time we come to England, we will have a choreographer, and this sequence might be a little more precise than it is at the