Pygmalion (1938)

Prof. Henry Higgins: Yes, you squashed cabbage leaf, you disgrace to the noble architecture of these columns, you incarnate insult to the English language, I could pass you off as the Queen of Sheba!

This may be the best adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s play.  I love this film!

Professor Henry Higgins (Leslie Howard) bets that he can pass Cockney flower seller Eliza Doolittle (Wendy Hiller) off as a duchess with six months of training in phonetics. With Wilfred Larson as Alfred P. Doolittle and Esme Percy as Count Aristid Kaparthy.

Leslie Howard makes a splendid Henry Higgins but the real revelation is Wendy Hiller in her second film.  With Hiller, Eliza is keeping her Cockney soul under check at al times whereas Audrey Hepburn always seems to me as a born princess struggling to escape her flower girl disguise.  The other performances are of a very high standard.  Asquith does an excellent job of opening up the story so it does not seem unnecessarily stagey.  I had a smile on my face throughout.  Very warmly recommended.

George Bernard Shaw and the adaptors of his play won the Academy Award for Best Screenplay, making Shaw the only Nobel Prize winner to also have an Oscar.  Shaw said “It’s an insult for them to offer me any honour, as if they had never heard of me before – and it’s very likely they never have. They might as well send some honour to George for being King of England.”  Pygmalion also received nominations in the categories of Best Picture, Best Actor (Howard) and Best Actress (Hiller).

“Trailer” – Professor Higgins makes Eliza an offer she can’t refuse