Pygmalion (1938)

Directors:

Anthony Asquith
Leslie Howard

Writers:

George Bernard Shaw (play)
George Bernard Shaw (scenario and dialogue)

Release Date:

3 March 1939 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

He picked up a girl from the gutter - and changed her into a glamorous society butterfly ! . . . See Wendy Hiller, new star discovery, in this amazing role !

Plot:

Shaw's play in which a Victorian dialect expert bets that he can teach a lower-class girl to speak proper English and thus be taken for a lady.

Plot Keywords:

Forbidden Love | Male Female Relationship | High Society | Role Reversal | Mentor

Awards:

Won Oscar. Another 1 win & 4 nominations

Cast

Leslie Howard	...	Professor Henry Higgins
Wendy Hiller	...	Eliza Doolittle
Wilfrid Lawson	...	Alfred Doolittle
Marie Lohr	...	Mrs. Higgins
Scott Sunderland	...	Colonel George Pickering
Jean Cadell	...	Mrs. Pearce
David Tree	...	Freddy Eynsford-Hill
Everley Gregg	...	Mrs. Eynsford-Hill
Leueen MacGrath	...	Clara Eynsford Hill
Esme Percy	...	Count Aristid Karpathy
Violet Vanbrugh	...	Ambassadress
Iris Hoey	...	Ysabel, Social Reporter
Viola Tree	...	Perfide, Social Reporter
Irene Browne	...	Duchess (as Irene Brown)
Kate Cutler	...	Grand Old Lady

Also Known As:

Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion (UK) (complete title)

Runtime:

96 min | USA:89 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Wide Range System)

Certification:

South Korea:12 | Canada:G (Ontario) | Australia:G | Finland:S | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #4845)

Filming Locations:

Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

Gabriel Pascal Productions

Trivia:

The first British film to use the word "bloody" in its dialogue.

Quotes:

Eliza Doolittle: Walk? Not bloody likely. I'm going to take a taxi.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "L.A. Law: Pigmalion (#1.21)" (1987)

One of the greatest of all British films.

Perfect cinema. That was my reaction when I first saw Pygmalion, the first of 50 viewings and counting, and I still think so. Who could not fall in love with Leslie Howard, one of our greatest actors, so tragically assassinated in the Second World War? Wendy Hiller IS Eliza. The cast is flawless. The script... words fail me, for George Bernard Shaw was a genius, he did not simply adapt his play for the screen, it is so good that it is like it's happening before your eyes. My God, after seeing this is there anyone out there who thinks 'My Fair Lady', the slowest film musical on record, is the best screen version of Shaw? If they do, they are mad.

That film moves me not one jot, everything is so clean, so smug, so unreal. Here we see poverty, but also hope. These are not actors and actresses moving through the sets garbed in Cecil Beaton, but real people, real suffering, but humanity lights every scene like a beacon. The unbearably moving scenes of Eliza capturing society at the ball, the irresistible waltz, watch this with no tears in your eyes, I dare you. Halliwells Film Guide calls this 'one of the most heartening and adult British films of the thirties'. Too right. I cannot fault this film, it is priceless. By the way, I saw 'My Fair Lady' on stage recently, and it's miles better than the film version. Warner Bros really let Shaw down, and it's impossible to put it right. But this...well it is a big compensation. And I don't miss the songs one little bit.

There are so many classic scenes I can't pick any out. Of course viewers will spot that it was 'updated' to 1938, and the original play set in the Edwardians. That doesn't hurt it at all, 'polite' society didn't change much in the intervening years and gives the play an added 'contemporary' edge. Please, please, please see this film. You will be gripped.