Thursday, April 19, 2018

LOGOS: My Fair Lady

The Master at work...
I make no secret of my love for the artwork of James McMullan. From the cool sophistication of his Anything Goes for the 1987 revival to the sensual heat of his Hello Again (off-Broadway, 1994), I just love what he does.  But his work for the current revival of My Fair Lady may just be my favorite of his!

Grade: A+

The epic, colorful scene fits the epic musical it is representing.  It's not just that it depicts the scene where it all starts, Covent Garden, but it beautifully shows an important theme of the classic musical: the overlapping of the classes.  Here, opera goers mingle with their footmen and carriage drivers, and a myriad of street vendors and buskers.  And like the classes of people that populate Lerner and Loewe's masterpiece (and Shaw before them), the classes may mingle, but then never look at each other and barely interact. 


The horizontal, more panoramic version reminds me so much of Seurat's A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, the impetus, of course, for another masterpiece musical.  One of the great things about this version of the logo is, like any work of art, the more you look at it, the more you get from it, the more you are drawn in.  Who are these people? What are their stories?


If you know the show, you might have other questions.  Is that redheaded girl with the basket of flowers in the center our Eliza?  Is the man in brown a "tech takin' 'er down" like our Higgins?

Both sets of questions really expose what makes this an excellent show logo.  Whether you know the show or not, it makes you stop and look at it more closely. Brilliant.

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