Minha Bela Dama

As I've noted in the past, I love international versions of musicals, and have posted quite a few videos -- but it's been a while since I've done so.  So, let's rectifiy that.

This is about 45 minutes of a Brazilian production of My Fair Lady.  The quality is excellent, since it was done for television.  The show stars Daniel Boaventura and Amanda Acosta, which I'm going to guess doesn't mean a whole lot to most people here.  I have half-a-dozen different original cast recordings from around the world of this show, and I like comparing which come close to getting it "right."  The challenge for other countries is that some have trouble with the mysogeny of Higgins (for instance, the Italian production is too romantic), and some miss on the humor (like the German production).  The one outside of the Broadway original that comes closest is Israel.  This Brazilian show does a nice job, though I think it strikes me as a touch stilted.

One observation I've made, though, is that the one thing that all productions seem to get right is that every country has a classic, older, codger song-and-dance man who can player Eliza's father, Alfred P. Doolittle.  And the fellow here, Francarlos Reis -- who you see in the screenshot of the first video below -- fits right in, doing a very good job.  (He sings "With a Little Bit of Luck" arround the 19:30 mark.)

This is broken into two videos.  The first is the opening 24 minutes of the show and features the songs "Why Can't the English?, "Wouldn't It Be Loverly" and the aforementioned "With a Little Bit of Luck."  The second video seems to come at the start of the second act and includes :"You Did It," "Just You Wait," and "Show Me," as well as a reprise of "Wouldn't It Be Loverly?"

It's fun to watch the whole thing, but it's of course fine just to get a smattering of the dialogue and just around to find the songs.