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Comparing Pygmalion and My Fair Lady
Through the years, countless film directors have adapted and recreated various novels and plays to make them ideal for the big-screen. In many cases, directors strive to keep their screenplay adaptations true to the original literature; however, viewers often find contrasts in certain areas of the film. George Bernard Shaw, author of the play Pygmalion, who had passed away prior to the production of My Fair Lady in 1964, therefore, he could not assist in the transition from play to musical. For this reason, director George Cukor has attempted to retain some similarities and also incorporate a few changes of his own. Although readers can discover numerous similarities between My Fair Lady and Pygmalion in certain aspects such as character interaction and the portrayal of social status, one can also detect several contradictions in the two plots, especially during the conclusion.
Among the number of similarities readers will come across are the likenesses between the two works in character interaction. For example, in both the play and the film, Professor Henry Higgins has an overbearing paternal mentality regarding Eliza Doolittle. In accordance with the dialogue that Higgins speaks in the film regarding Eliza?s filthy disposition, readers of Pygmalion discover practically the same words: ?You know, Pickering, if you consider a shilling, not as a simple shilling, but as a percentage of this girl?s income, it works out as fully equivalent to sixty or seventy guineas from a millionaire? (Shaw 21). In addition, in both the film and the play, Eliza and Colonel Pickering share a bond that stems from her vulnerability and his compassion. For the duration of her stay at 27A Wimpole Street, Eliza often seeks comfort in the sympathetic Colonel because without this ally, she knows that she will not survive the wrath of Henry Higgins. In Shaw?s original version, readers can interpret Eliza?s trepidation through the dialogue. Similarly, in Cukor?s musical adaptation, viewers have the ability to watch Eliza?s facial expressions and body movement to understand her emotions. The videocassette offers the viewers a whole new world that they did not experience during their novel reading. Although the presentation of character interaction differs slightly in Pygmalion and My Fair Lady, the same themes occur.
Another evident simil...
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... to the play. Both versions have interesting variations that grab their audiences? attention; therefore, one is not superior to the other in any way. Certainly, George Cukor only establishes the variations in order to achieve a decent reception from moviegoers, because in most cases, people would rather see a film with a romantic, happy ending than see an unclear, ambiguous conclusion. Although there are more similarities than differences, a slight change, such as the emotions that the conclusions conjure in both readers and viewers, could change the entire theme and conclusion of the play.
Works Cited:
Shaw, George Bernard. Pygmalion. New York: Pocket Books, 1957.
My Fair Lady. Dir. George Cukor. Videocassette. Warner Brothers, 1964.
Burroughs, Liz. ?EUFS: My Fair Lady.? EUFS: The Film Society. 5 March 2001. Online.
Available http://eufs.org.uk//films/my_fair_lady.html. 30 October 2001.
Ebert, Roger. ?My Fair Lady.? Ebert. 23 September 1994. Online. Available
http://www.suntimes.com/ebert/ebert_reviews/1994/09/941937.html. 30 October 2001.
Moore, Harry T. Preface to George Bernard Shaw, Creative Artist by Homer E. Woodbridge.
Pygmalion. George Bernard Shaw.
These changes in the film make the plot more comprehendible to the viewer, and overall make the film more realistic to the viewer than the play does for the
John Patrick Shanley creates a movie as a whole I feel was more informative than the play. In the play you have 4 characters Sister Aloysius, Father Flynn, Sister James, and Mrs. Muller. While the movie introduces a few other characters, for instance the children. For me the children made a difference because they for one made me understand what kind of kids Sister James was dealing with. I really thought that being able to see the way Father Flynn interacted with all of the young boys including Donald Muller was really helpful when trying to draw your conclusion of Father Flynn versus when reading it your left to imagine for instance; what some of the kids are like. The way the book sets you up your left leaning to Father Flynn being exactly what Sister Aloysius accuses him to be. We also get to see how sister James interacts with the kids and how Sister Aloysius influences her to change the way she deals with and teaches her class.
The play was complete in itself being that it led the reader to use his or her imagination to put together all of the complexities of their interactions. That being said, I would recommend the film over the written play because of how powerful the messages shown by the actors through body language are. They brought a level of depth to the message that the original author was unable to achieve.
Filmmaking and cinematography are art forms completely open to interpretation in a myriad ways: frame composition, lighting, casting, camera angles, shot length, etc. The truly talented filmmaker employs every tool available to make a film communicate to the viewer on different levels, including social and emotional. When a filmmaker chooses to undertake an adaptation of a literary classic, the choices become somewhat more limited. In order to be true to the integrity of the piece of literature, the artistic team making the adaptation must be careful to communicate what is believed was intended by the writer. When the literature being adapted is a play originally intended for the stage, the task is perhaps simplified. Playwrights, unlike novelists, include some stage direction and other instructions regarding the visual aspect of the story. In this sense, the filmmaker has a strong basis for adapting a play to the big screen.
The premise of the plot is held in tact but the setting is shifted several hundred years, to the 1970s. The characters’ names remain familiar. The dialogue is contemporary English, yet you can still recognize the similarities in conversation. Major themes from the original work – revenge, guilt, self doubt, fate, and prophecy – still exist in this manipulated adaptation. “He (Morrissette) is able to make an interesting point about how the difference between tragedy and comedy is often how the material is viewed by the audience”.
In conclusion I think that the stage directions and dramatic irony are significant to the play, and without them there would be no need for a lot of the events that happen in the play.
Now in the play in act 5 a total of four of the characters died but in the movie only two died in Act 5. The only real similarities are that Romeo and Juliet die and Balthazar told Romeo that Juliet died. At the same time the differences are that in the movie Romeo never went to the apothecary witch in the play he did. Also In the movie when Romeo and Balthasar went to the Capulet tomb Romeo never gave his servant the reason why he did go into the tomb and he opened the tomb with a boulder but in the play he told Balthasar that he was going to give juliet a final kiss and retrieve a ring from her. Romeo also opened the tomb the a iron crowbar. And the biggest Difference was that Lady Montague died from grief but in the movie she lived and Romeo never fought Parris in the movie at the Capulet
To represent and to appeal to today's society while a large amount of the themes and values stayed the same, some of these ideas I had to alter. I did this through the language and form of the play and also by using film techniques, if I hadn't of done this the appropriation would have seemed unrealistic and the audience would be unable to relate to the film.
Transformations inherently contain traces of the author’s social and cultural context. Much of the same can be applied to “Much ado about nothing”. It incorporates comical features, yet retains the sense of tragedy which is attached to almost all of Shakespeare’s plays. Brain Percival’s role as a director, was determining, understanding and distinguishing the social norms and the social structure of the society, and how the themes represented in the play can be transformed into a modern text. The Elizabethan society was typically a patriarchal society. Percival has used as well as transformed certain themes and textual features to ensure, that the film is more appealing and assessable to the critical modern audience.
Kenneth Branagh creates his own individualistic adaptation of this classic through the use of visual imagery, characterization, and setting. Branagh cut many lines and speeches from the text to better support his interpretation of a more open and informal society of warm-hearted, affectionate characters. Though Shakespeare's mood is more formal, Branagh remains true to the essence of the play as all of the same characters and most of the dialogue are justly included in the film. Although distinct differences can be made between Branagh’s film and Shakespeare’s written work, they both share a common denominator of good old-fashioned entertainment; and in the world of theater, nothing else really matters.
For example, Miller does not portray Abigail Williams as the leader of the group of girls, but more as an equal. In Hytner's representation of Abby, he makes her the "head" of the group, and every girl does as she does. Another difference between the play and movie is how the first scene between Abby and John Proctor takes place. In the play, Miller simply writes about how the two ...
As the case with most “Novel to Movie” adaptations, screenwriters for films will make minor, and sometimes drastic, adjustments to the original text in order to increase drama and to reach modern audiences. Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 film interpretation of The Great Gatsby followed the 1925 classic great plot quite accurately, with minor deviations. However, Luhrmann made some notable differences to the characters and settings of The Great Gatsby in order for the story to relate to the current generation and to intensity the plot
One notable difference between William Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Julie Taymor’s film version of the play is the altered scenes that made quite a difference between the play and the movie version. This difference has the effects of creating a different point of view by altering the scenes affected the movie and how Taymor felt was necessary by either by keeping or deleting certain parts from the play. I use “Altered Scene” in the way of how Julia Taymor recreates her own point of view for the movie and the direction she took in order to make the audience can relate to the modern day film. I am analyzing the way that the altered scenes changes to make a strong impression on the audiences different from the play. This paper will demonstrate
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Adaptation of any kind has been a debate for many years. The debate on cinematic adaptations of literary works was for many years dominated by the questions of fidelity to the source and by the tendencies to prioritize the literary originals over their film versions (Whelehan, 2006). In the transference of a story from one form to another, there is the basic question of adherence to the source, of what can be lost (Stibetiu, 2001). There is also the question of what the filmmakers are being faithful to or is it the novel’s plot in every detail or the spirit of the original (Smith, 2016). These are only few query on the issue of fidelity in the film adaptation.