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The screeches and lead to the perfectBy Susan ManningTribune Staff WriterIt looked like a nightmare version cf a ragpickers’ convention.But the mud-streaked old ladies, the unshaven, shoeless old men and the screeches and hollers coming from every corner of the room were all part of a firmly organized pandemonium— preparations for the curtain to rise on Sisler High School’s production of My Fair Lady, the play which ran longer on Broadway than any other musical comedy in theatre history.“That’s my hat, I’m a guttersnipe,” screeched a grubby, shabby and fuzzy-headed old flower-seller, firmly clutching one side of a shapeless piece of yellow-green fur.I’m a more important guttersnipe,” retorted her opponent, clutching the other side of the animal just as firmly.Their tug-o-war was interrupted by a young man dressed in what appeared to be scratchy black long underwear who bounded between them, turning somersaults.He ducked to avoid a harrassed woman waving a paint-brush at him and bumped into two old mud-faced cronies playing poker on the floor.We're artists“Watch it, mate, hollered the oldest and the muddiest. “We’re artists, you know,” He wiggled his ears to confirm the point.A frantic gentleman rushed across the room, avoiding bodies engaged in splashing dirt on their faces, putting holes in their shoes and ripping their shirts.“Don’t be nervous, anyone,” he shouted, nervously wringing his hands. “Just keep calm.”Abruptly, strains of music could be heard from a distance and a new wave of chaos hit the confusion.Where’s my moustache, shouled an old beggar garbed in bottomless pants and footless socks. “What dirty rat stole my moustache?”A young dandy with powder in his hair and a tuxedo swimming around his ankles retreated into a closet, muttering, “First cue, enter on the right side ... no, no, that’s not right ..The hand-wringing gentleman tore in and out of the room shouting, “Where’s F.liza? Oh dear, has anybody seen Eliza?Suddenly the house lights dimmed, the curtain rose and a quiet girl no one had noticed in the melee stepped onto the stage, singing, “Vy-o-lets for syle! Waon't yew buy a Vy-o-let, sir?”The production had begun.It was Covent Garden, it was old Cockney England, complete with “Oaaarns”, “Blimies!” and mud on the face, and it was Barbara Dumas as Eliza who gleefully screeched, chortled, bellowed and wept her way into a production worthy of a professional theatre company.“Aayeeowwwww! yew fancy gentlemen ain’t got naoh respects fur a lay-dy! she wailed and the audience laughed with delight.“Oi’m jist a pur, ignorant young gurrl,” she wept, smearing the dirt on her nose and hurling violets to the ground.Backstage, the director wiped his brow and began to smile.Eliza had just begun trilling the delights of a warm fire and a box of chocolates in Wouldn't It Be Loverly? when a new crisis arose.“My moustache is too stiff, cried Colonel Pickering; twitching his upperBefore . . .Brian Haughain is transformed by make-up experts T I. White, left, from a well-groomed high school' senior , . .lip stiffly. “How can an English aristocrat talk with a stiff upper lip?”“Precisely,” smiled the make-up man, sitting complacently in a corner. Colonel Pickering returned to the stage, his upper lip still twitching.Rousing closeScene one came to a rousing close and scuttling feet and dents in the curtain could be detected as the thes-pians moved their own scenery.There were a few frantic whispers, a subdued shriek from one lady who suffered a squashed toe in the move, and the curtain rose to a scene which out-did the first.Alfred Doolittle, Eliza's conniving, philosophical and delightful old lecher of a father, bounced on to the sage twitching his shaggy moustache, flapping his elbows, and gleefully bellowing the crimes a man can get away with, With a Little Bit of Luck.Played by Brian Haughain, ordinarily a good-looking, clean-shaven high school student, his face was so muddy, his voice so lusty and his silly grin so infectious he came close to stopping the show.As the first act continued, the applause continued to rise as mothers poked each other in the audience and whispered proudly, “That’s my daughter up there with the dirt on her face!”And so it went.Colonel Pickering hovered stiffly around the edge of the stage, sniffing, and occasionally providing the wittiest deliveries in the play.Alfred Doolittle continued to bound In and out of the scenery, grinning and scamperingThe elegant ladies of Ascot, afterhollersshow. . . after. . . into the dirty unshaven Alfred Doolittle who attempts to make the best of daughter Eliza's good fortune. Diana Magis helps.frantically anchoring down their plumage, swept about the stage with surprisingly good voices chorusing the delights of the afternoon’s races.And Eliza slowly became a lady. “Eeeeowwww . . .” she screamed, “Jest you wayte, ’Enry ’Iggins.” Unfortunately, ’Enry at that moment was W'aiting to remember his lines, but a swift prompt from Eliza saved him.As the evening progressed, there were fewer harried whispers from the wings, fewer dents in the curtain between scenes, heavier Cockney accents, more mud on the faces and less perspiration on the brow of the conductor.“It’s going well, isn’t it?” smiled a lady school-teacher doubling as costume fitter.It won’t if someone doesn't tell me whether I'm supposed to have feathers or dirt for this scene, cried a normally well-groomed young student rushing about in woollen stockings and a rhinestone necklace.Eliza sat calmly in the hetween-scenes confusion, sipping a soft drink. “I’m not nervous at all, she smiled. “It’s a fine play.”Then she was back on stage, grimacing, tossing her head and singing Show Me with a spirit to rival Julie Adams.As the show ended with a roar of applause, someone’s mother stopped clapping and sighed,“You think living through examination time is bad. You should try listening to fi.'i versions of the Ascot Gavotte in your kitchen sometime.”The last presentation of My Fair Lady was set for Saturday night at Sisler High School, north Winnipeg.
Newspaper Details
Winnipeg Tribune
Winnipeg, Manitoba, CA
Sat, Apr 18, 1964
Page 27
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
CA 18 Jun 2024
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