I can count on one hand how many musicals I really like and this 1956 classic about the Cockney flower seller who becomes a lady creeps in there, wrapped up in a rosy glow of nostalgia.
I put it down to the fact I was in a school production of it more years ago than I care to remember and learned the lyrics of practically every song, despite being consigned to the back row of the chorus. I could have stepped in to any character's role at a moment's notice had they asked, which they didn't.
Since then I've seen the Oscar-winning 1964 film version starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison but that's it, yet even now I can sing along to everything from Eliza Doolittle's Wouldn’t It Be Loverly yearnings for a better life to her boozer dad's need to Get Me To The Church on Time. And I was already humming them under my breath in Sunderland Empire before the live orchestra struck the first note at this epic production of the Lerner & Loewe musical.
