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My Fair Lady was without doubt the most popularly successful musical of its era. Before the close of its spectacular run of 2, 717 performances from 1956 to 1962 it had comfortably surpassed Oklahoma!'s previous record of 2, 248. And unlike the ephemeral success of the wartime Broadway heroines depicted in Lady in the Dark and One Touch of Venus, librettist-lyricist Alan Jay Lerner's and composer Frederick “Fritz” Loewe's fair lady went on to age phenomenally well. Over 18 million cast albums were sold and profits from the staged performances, albums, and 1964 film came to the then astronomical figure of $800 million. Critically successful revivals followed in 1975 and 1981, the latter with Rex Harrison (Henry Higgins) and Cathleen Nesbitt (Mrs. Higgins) reclaiming their original Broadway roles.

This chapter examines the work of Frederick Loewe. Loewe was the son of Austrian tenor Edmund Loewe, who created the role of Prince Danilo in the 1906 Berlin première of Lehar’s Die Lustige Witwe (The Merry Widow). At the age of thirteen, Frederick appeared as a piano soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic; at fifteen, he wrote the pop hit Katrina, which apparently sold over a million copies in Europe. He determined upon a career in serious music and studied piano and composition with Ferruccio Busoni (Kurt Weill’s teacher). Arriving in America in 1924, Loewe was unable to succeed at a musical career and went through a string of unlikely occupations, including prospecting, cowpoking, and professional boxing.

Chapter 2 discusses the genesis of My Fair Lady from 1954 up to opening night in 1956. It includes an explanation of how Herman Levin came to be the producer, Rex Harrison and Stanley Holloway the male stars, Julie Andrews the female lead, and Moss Hart the director. It also charts Lerner and Loewe’s final struggles to bring the show to the stage, with contractual problems and troubles in finding a production team. The chapter ends with the successful reviews of the opening night performance in March 1956.

This chapter looks at how Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe adapt T. H. White’s The Once and Future King in both original 1960 Broadway stage production and the 1967 Hollywood film adaptation. Specifically, this chapter looks at how the musical Camelot interprets White’s version of Arthurian legend, tracking the changes Lerner and Loewe made and especially how song affects characterization. Drawing on archival research completed at the Library of Congress, this chapter examines the process of adapting this long unwieldy myth into a musical. Although Loewe did not work on the 1967 film, Lerner wrote the screenplay. Since the film version remains fixed and widely available, it is worth investigating how the changes made to it further adapt the tale. Since Lerner and Loewe chose to focus on the love triangle between Arthur, Guenevere, and Lancelot, this chapter pays particular attention to how Lerner and Loewe alter their characters.

Brigadoon was one of de Mille’s most successful musicals and one of her happiest collaborations. The show drew on many stylistic sources, including modern dance, traditional Scottish dance, and ballet. De Mille and director Robert Lewis worked closely together to create seamless transitions between dialogue scenes and dance numbers. They also staged a chase scene and a funeral dance, emphasizing a minor character, Harry Beaton, who threatens to destroy the mythical Scottish village by leaving it forever. Beaton’s character serves to complicate an otherwise sentimental plot, providing an example of the way de Mille’s choreography contributed a distinct layer of meaning to the musical as a whole.

This chapter focuses on the musicals of songwriting teams Rodgers and Hammerstein, and Lerner and Loewe. Rodgers and Hammerstein's influence on Broadway was immense. Their format of “musical play” was all the rage at one point, and even daffy musical comedy became rationalized. Some shows seemed to be their work in all but name; Loewe and Lerner's Brigadoon (1947) was the main one, with its powerful sense of community, its long first act and short second, its Agnes de Mille choreography, and its thematic richness—all elements of Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. The remainder of the chapter details the stories behind the making of Rodgers and Hammerstein's State Fair (1945), Oklahoma! (1955), Carousel (1956), The King and I (1956), South Pacific (1958), The Sound of Music (1965); and Lerner and Loewe's Brigadoon (1947), Gigi (1958), and My Fair Lady (1964).

This chapter examines Lerner’s final years, in which he moved to London and started a new life. It includes a discussion of Dance a Little Closer, his unsuccessful final musical, as well as correspondence regarding a film version of The Merry Widow, a revision of Carmelina, and a musical version of My Man Godfrey, none of which came to fruition.

The concluding chapter discusses de Mille’s Broadway career after the 1940s. Although she continued to work on Broadway through 1969, her work never again achieved the level of success she attained in Oklahoma!, Carousel, and Brigadoon. She developed a reputation for being a difficult collaborator, which was grounded on past behavior but may also have been influenced by her gender. Rodgers and Hammerstein put less emphasis on dance in South Pacific, the musical that followed Allegro, and did not hire de Mille again. Other choreographers, including Jerome Robbins and Bob Fosse, surpassed her in prominence. Their stylistic innovations made her work seem dated.Despite this, she produced several works that were either financially lucrative or important for her legacy, including Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Paint Your Wagon, and Kwamina. She also became an activist, serving as one of the founders of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, still in existence today.