My Fair Lady is a popular musical that has a book and lyrics as well that were written by Alan Jay Lerner. The music created is by Frederick Loewe. My Fair Lady 's 1956 Broadway production was a blast, and it set a new record for any major theatre production in history in terms of the length it ran for. Behind this record was the perfect musical.

Producer Gabriel Pascal was given the rights to produce film versions of George Bernard Shaw's plays in the mid 1930s. Pygmalion was one of them, and with the idea he had for this play, he approached lyricist Alan Jay Lerner. Lerner and his writing partner, Frederick Loewe, started working on the project. They soon realized that it was impossible to obey the rules for this musical construction. To begin with, there was no room for an ensemble. There was also no subplot or love story. Pygmalion has only one dimension, and has no love story. Many others, such as Oscar Hammerstein II, said that it was near to impossible to convert the play to a musical. Loewe and Lerner abandoned the project for nearly 2 years. Gabriel Pascal passed away during this time.

After Lerner read Pascal's obituary, he thought about Pygmalion again. Shortly after that he and Loewe reunited, and since then, everything fell into place. The insurmountable obstacles seemed to vanish when musical theatre was transformed since Pascal's death.

Film adaptation
An Oscar-winning film version of the play was created in 1964. Harrison played the part of Higgins. There was some controversy regarding the casting of Audrey Hepburn instead of Julie Andrews for the character Eliza. This is believed to be mainly due to Hepburn's singing voice being dubbed by Marni Nixon for most songs Andrews earned that year's Oscar for Best Actress in Mary Poppins.

Popular culture
The musical,My Fair Lady, has been spoofed or served as an inspiration for newer creations. An example is The Addams Family, Family Guy, The Simpsons, Duckman, The Nanny, Arthur, Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, The Andy Griffith Show, Will & Grace, Doctor Who, Mucha Lucha!, Animaniacs and Star Trek: Voyager.On television series, Seinfeld, Elaine Benes's boyfriend, Aaron, takes her, Morty Seinfeld and Helen Seinfeld to see My Fair Lady in The Raincoats, Part 1.

In one of the Danny Phantom episodes, Splitting Images, the Box Ghost assaults him with costumes and props from the broadway classic, My Fair Lady.

Additionally, in one part of Sesame Street, Oscar the Grouch sings a parody called I've Grown Accustomed To Her Fur. This is after he orders a breed of dog called a Rotten-Doodle. The dog is named Cranky, and it turns out to be a sweet and helpful female dog. In another part, Rosita is teased about her Spanish accent and wants to sound like everyone else. Then, a pig called Henry Piggins attempts to teach her how to speak. He tells her to repeatedly say, The pig is big and did a wiggly jig. Ultimately, her speech changes, and Piggins, Rosita, and Big Bird sing a parody of The Rain in Spain called The Pig Is Big. Piggins finally says that he is going to the theatre to see PIGmailion.