East Providence native has key role in 'My Fair Lady' tour, coming to Providence May 11
Even though the title is “My Fair Lady,” the 1964 movie featured a top-name male star, so the focus of every rendition since has centered on the male lead — until Broadway director Bart Sher got involved.
The classic musical, based on the George Bernard Shaw play “Pygmalion,” was revamped for a New York City run several years ago, and the touring production opens May 11 at Providence Performing Arts Center.
“The difference this time around is Bart Sher,” notes Kevin Pariseau, the East Providence native playing Colonel Pickering, who befriends a struggling young woman as she learns to erase her thick Cockney accent to find better employment. “He refocused the play on Eliza. Over the years, people lost focus on the one person in the play who makes a change.”
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Eliza sells flowers on the street and longs to sell them in a shop. Brash phonetics professor Henry Higgins bets a colleague, Colonel Pickering, that he can teach her to speak proper English and pass for a lady. Pickering’s kinder manner proves more helpful to her.
The colonel role is intriguing, Pariseau notes, because the character serves as a surrogate for the audience on stage.
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“All the questions and thoughts the audience has while watching are embodied in this character. He embodies the desire to protect Eliza, who is just hammered by Higgins throughout the show,” Pariseau says.
Clad in Tony Award-winning costumes, the “My Fair Lady” cast brings the nostalgia, too, he adds.
“In my parents’ album collection in the 1970s, there were three musicals — ‘My Fair Lady,’ ‘Camelot’ and ‘The Sound of Music.’ When I talked to someone, he said his parents had the same three. I think those were the common ones in every home. In this case, the title sells itself. People are nostalgic for the title, and they love the show,” Pariseau says.
He predicts they will love this production even more than others, given the feeling of excitement and triumph Eliza embodies on her journey of self-improvement.
“It’s about her transformation, something that’s all over our culture today," Pariseau says. "People are reinventing themselves and seeing themselves in a new light. She ends the play a very different woman, and not just because of her accent.”
Transformation is something he knows about himself. Raised in Riverside, Pariseau would see shows at Trinity Repertory Company with his mother. He acted in and directed shows at East Providence High School and later at Brown University, although he majored in mathematics.
“I was the first person in my family to go to college, and I thought I should have a backup,” says the 1985 Brown grad, who taught math and music in California before returning East to pursue acting.
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Pariseau, now based in New York, longed to join a resident company like Trinity, but with so few left he began auditioning for Broadway, tours, television and movies. His credits range from reading Herman Wouk’s "The Winds of War" for a 45-hour audio book, to playing arts editor of the Village Voice in 1960 in season four of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.”
In Providence, he’ll have plenty of family and classmates in the audience, as well as legions of people his mother has invited.
“I’ll have earned my salary with all the tickets she’s selling!” he says with a laugh.
If you go ...
What: "My Fair Lady"
When: May 11-15
Where: Providence Performing Arts Center, 220 Weybosset St., Providence
Tickets: $20-$89
COVID safety: Masks are recommended but not required. Proof of vaccination not required.
Info: ppacri.org, (401) 421-2787
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: East Providence native has key role in play coming to PPAC
