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Claire Danes Will Play Eliza Doolittle in Roundabout's Broadway Pygmalion

Claire Danes is set to make her Broadway debut as Eliza Doolittle opposite Jefferson Mays' Henry Higgins in the Roundabout Theatre Company's upcoming production of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion. The play will begin previews on September 21 and open on October 18 at the American Airlines Theatre, directed by David Grindley. Pygmalion is set to run through December 16. Additional cast members are expected to be announced shortly.

Pygmalion plays on the complex business of human relationships in a social world. When Professor Henry Higgins (Mays) comes across a poor and uneducated Cockney girl named Eliza Doolittle (Danes), Higgins makes a bet that he can take Eliza from the gutters of London and pass her off as a society lady simply by teaching her the right dialect in which to speak. Higgins soon discovers that this task involves much more than knowledge; it involves patience and most importantly, affairs of the heart. Shaw's play inspired the legendary musical My Fair Lady.

Danes has appeared onstage in two well-reviewed dance pieces choreographed by Tamar Rogoff at P.S. 122: Christina Olson: American Model and Edith & Jenny. She can currently be seen as the youthful version of a character played by Vanessa Redgrave in the movie Evening, co-starring Hugh Dancy, who was directed by Grindley this past season on Broadway in Journey's End. Her films include Shopgirl, The Family Stone, Stage Beauty, Terminator 3, Igby Goes Down, The Hours, Little Women, Romeo & Juliet, Les Miserables, The Rainmaker, the upcoming Stardust and many more. Danes received an Emmy nomination for My So-Called Life.

The design team includes Jonathan Fensom (sets & costumes), Jason Taylor (lights), Gregory Clarke (sound) and Majella Hurley (dialect coach).

http://www.broadway.com/Gen/Buzz_Story.aspx?ci=550247

It's a pleasure to read that Claire is trying on "Pygmalion." It's a run of only three months that will give her (and audiences) a chance to get used to stage dynamics.

She also, after "Stage Beauty," will likely acquit herself well with some kind of sharp accent ... though precisely imitating Eliza's Lisson Grove / Covent Garden, as in the play and musical, may be a bit beyond her skill.

I can't agree with some of the suggestions (on the Planet-Claire mailing list, especially) that she is taking too much of a pause in her movie career, avoiding "semi-retirement," and the like. She's only 28! Did her current costar Glenn Close hurt her movie cred and casting prospects by doing "Sunset Boulevard" at twice that age? I don't think so.

CNN features an interesting interview from the Associated Press with Claire about her role in "Pygmalion".

"It's more fun than I expected. I was kind of dreading it. I was sort of like willing myself to do it, daring myself to do it," she says. "So far, I haven't completely collapsed or been fired -- I was prepared for that even though my big fat face is on the poster."

Paul Wontorek from the Stage Notes Blog published two photos from the play with Claire as Eliza Doolittle.

And the first reviews are out. Reuters tries to summarize them. It looks like a very mixed reaction, ranging from "I could have watched all night" and "handsomely done" to "doesn't make much of an impression," "plain vanilla" and even "dull".