Diana Rigg sets My Fair Lady exit date

The stage & screen veteran will play her final performance as Mrs. Higgins on September 9, 2018.

It has been reported that Tony Award winner Diana Rigg is scheduled to play her final performance as Mrs. Higgins in Lincoln Center Theater's acclaimed revival of Lerner & Loewe's classic musical My Fair Lady at the Vivian Beaumont Theater on September 9, 2018. Replacement casting will be announced shortly.

Dame Diana Rigg won a Tony Award in 1994 for her performance in the title role of Medea. She also earned Tony nominations for Abelard and Heloise (1971), The Misanthrope (1975), and this year for her current role in My Fair Lady. On screen, she earned a Golden Globe nomination for The Hospital in 1972, won an Emmy Award for Rebecca in 1997, and has earned a 8 Emmy Award nominations to date (with four nods, including a 2018 nomination, for her role as Lady Olenna Tyrell on hit series "Game of Thrones"). 

The principal cast of My Fair Lady currently includes Tony and two-time Emmy Award nominee Lauren Ambrose (as Eliza Doolittle), Tony Award nominee Harry Hadden-Paton (making his NY stage debut as Henry Higgins), two-time Tony Award winner Norbert Leo Butz (as Alfred P. Doolittle), Tony Award winner Diana Rigg (as Mrs. Higgins), Allan Corduner (as Colonel Pickering), Jordan Donica (as Freddy Eynsford-Hill), Linda Mugleston (as Mrs. Pearce), and Clarke Thorell (as Zoltan Karpathy).

As previously reported, Kerstin Anderson assumes the role of Eliza Doolittle on Sunday matinee performances.

Directed by Tony Award winner Bartlett Sher, My Fair Lady began previews at the Vivian Beaumont Theater on March 15, 2018, ahead of an official opening on April 19.

The musical features book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by Frederick Loewe.

Synopsis: "Adapted from George Bernard Shaw's play and Gabriel Pascal's motion picture Pygmalion, the musical tells the story of a cockney flower girl named Eliza Doolittle, who attempts to pass as a lady after taking speech lessons from phoneticist professor Henry Higgins."

The creative team features music direction by Ted Sperling, choreography by Christopher Gattelli, scenic design by Michael Yeargan, costume design by Catherine Zuber, lighting design by Donald Holder, and sound design by Marc Salzberg.

This production marks the first Broadway revival in 25 years. The musical originally premiered in 1956, directed by Moss Hart and starring Julie Andrews and Rex Harrison, taking home a total of six Tony Awards in 1957, including "Best Musical." Three short-lived Broadway revivals were staged in 1976, 1981 and 1993.

The score of My Fair Lady features such musical theatre classics as "I Could Have Danced All Night," "Get Me to the Church on Time," "Wouldn't It Be Loverly," "The Rain in Spain," "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face," and "On the Street Where You Live."

My Fair Lady is produced by Lincoln Center Theater in association with Nederlander Presentations Inc.

My Fair Lady Tickets are available now for performances through to January 6, 2019.

^{(Photo by Joan Marcus)}