Craig Urbani discusses his biggest and most complex role in 'My Fair Lady'
Craig Urbani's humility and unassuming nature never cease to amaze me, even after interviewing him several times over the years.
Last year, we enjoyed a tête-à-tête over his role in “The Sound of Music”. Now he’s returning in Lerner & Loewe's musical masterpiece, “My Fair Lady”.
Presented by Pieter Toerien and Cape Town Opera, the show is fresh from a successful month-long run in the Mother City.
Urbani was making the most of his last day of leave - chilling by the pool at home - when I called to chat about the show, where he plays Henry Higgins.
After shooting the breeze over embracing a new year, he said: “We were at Artscape for four weeks. The run ended on January 12. The show was amazing.
“In the last week, all the cast members were getting messages from friends, acquaintances and even people we didn’t know, asking if there was a chance of getting a ticket.”
Urbani added: “It’s a very dense piece of theatre. It’s not a whimsical musical. The book is lush, layered and textured.
The script is not like a normal musical theatre script - and I’m generalising here - where the dialogue is just to get you from one song to another. The text is beautifully written.”
While he isn’t au fait with the book itself, he did his research on the production, which is directed by Steven Stead.
He added: “Steven always comes in knowing so much about what he is doing. He’s a very learned director.
“He doesn’t approach a piece unless he knows all the history about it, all the subtext about it or where it’s been done. He came in with so much knowledge about the piece. He was our go-to Wikipedia.
“He was able to answer all the questions and guide me through what is the biggest and most complex role I’ve ever played …”
Unpacking his character, he noted: “He’s very cerebral and nothing is obvious about him. With him, you have to kind of read between the lines all the time.
“He’s completely unacceptable and you can’t hate him for it but you do kind of go, ‘What’s going on with this crazy man, this highly intelligent, very difficult, very complex character?’
“So I think we’ve got to a point where you know it’s hard to make him likeable because he can be seen as very sexist and very classist.
“He is a sort of know-it-all as he’s a professor - so a very knowledgeable character. He calls Eliza (Dolittle) the most dreadful things. But the thing to remember about him is that it’s not because he is sexist; if he decided to take the bet with Colonel Pickering (played by Graham Hopkins) over a man, he would call the man the same things.”
Urbani added: “In the script, he says, ‘I would treat a flower girl as if she were a duchess and I would treat a duchess as if she were a flower girl’.
“So he just treats everyone the same. He can be unlikeable so we had to find a balance and, again, Steven helped me with it a lot.”
In the plethora of readings he’s done so far, he noted how funny the script is. Urbani was equally praiseworthy of the set, which has been designed by Greg King.
He shared: “Greg has designed this most incredible set. When we are on stage - a lot of the scenes take place in the study - you feel as if you are on a movie set. It is a functional study and combined seating area/lounge.
“It’s plush, it’s rich and it’s of the time. It just looks incredible. It is certainly a major step up in terms of set design from anything I’ve seen for some time.”
Urbani added: “And it’s well cast. We have the most incredible people doing it. We have great Elizas, very different in Brittany Smith and Leah Mari, who are doing a fantastic job.
“It’s wonderful because they are sharing it equally, which helps keep me on my toes. They are very different. Their rhythms are different.
“Then there’s Graham, who has just been an asset. He understands this kind of piece so well. He’s such an intellectual man, he’s so well-read. We had dialect coaches but all I had to do was listen to Graham, who is an Edwardian gentleman in how he speaks.”
He laughed: “Someone we don’t see enough of on stage is Mark Richardson, as Doolittle (Eliza’s father). He’s a real scene-stealer. I do all the hard work and he comes in and blows the roof off the place.”
The thespian pointed out that the ensemble cast of 36, which includes between 10 to 12 opera singers with vocals you can’t imagine - Duane Alexander has choreographed the most beautiful scenes, especially for ‘Get Me to the Church on Time’.”
Without giving too much away, although he couldn’t stop raving about this production, he pointed out: “This clever professor, who thinks he knows everything about everything, believes he’s the one working his magic and changing a flower girl into a high society lady.
“She’s his project and he says he’ll change her forever but doesn’t realise that she is seeping into the very fabric of his life and he is forever altered by her
“And, in the end, it’s always left a little ambiguous, do they end up together, don’t they?”
Theatregoers won’t want to miss this production as it transports them to a bygone era with its exceptional script and timeless songs.
Where: The Teatro, Montecasino.
When: Runs from January 25 to March 2, 7.30pm. Times differ on the weekend.
Cost: Ticket prices vary from R240 to R580 and can be purchased through Webtickets.