Editing My Fair Lady (section)

===Act I===
In [[Edwardian]] London, Eliza Doolittle is a flower girl with a thick [[Cockney]] accent. The noted [[phonetician]] Professor Henry Higgins encounters Eliza at [[Covent Garden]] and laments the vulgarity of her dialect ("Why Can't the English?"). Higgins also meets Colonel Pickering, another linguist, and invites him to stay as his houseguest. Eliza and her friends wonder what it would be like to live a comfortable life ("[[Wouldn't It Be Loverly]]?").

Eliza's [[dustman]] father, Alfred P. Doolittle, stops by the next morning searching for money for a drink ("[[With a Little Bit of Luck]]"). Soon after, Eliza comes to Higgins's house, seeking [[elocution]] lessons so that she can get a job as an assistant in a florist's shop. Higgins wagers Pickering that, within six months, by teaching Eliza to speak properly, he will enable her to pass for a proper lady.

Eliza becomes part of Higgins's household. Though Higgins sees himself as a kindhearted man who merely cannot get along with women ("I'm an Ordinary Man"), to others he appears self-absorbed and [[misogynistic]]. Eliza endures Higgins's tyrannical speech tutoring. Frustrated, she dreams of different ways to kill him ("Just You Wait"). Higgins's servants lament the stressful atmosphere ("The Servants' Chorus").

Just as Higgins is about to give up on her, Eliza suddenly recites one of her diction exercises in perfect upper-class style ("[[The Rain in Spain]]"). Though Mrs Pearce, the housekeeper, insists that Eliza go to bed, she declares she is too excited to sleep ("[[I Could Have Danced All Night]]").

For her first public tryout, Higgins takes Eliza to his mother's box at [[Ascot Racecourse]] ("Ascot Gavotte"). Though Eliza shocks everyone when she forgets herself while watching a race and reverts to foul language, she does capture the heart of Freddy Eynsford-Hill. Freddy calls on Eliza that evening, and he declares that he will wait for her in the street outside Higgins' house ("[[On the Street Where You Live]]").

Eliza's final test requires her to pass as a lady at the Embassy Ball. After more weeks of preparation, she is ready. ("Eliza's Entrance"). All the ladies and gentlemen at the ball admire her, and the Queen of [[Transylvania]] invites her to dance with the prince ("Embassy Waltz"). A Hungarian phonetician, Zoltan Karpathy, attempts to discover Eliza's origins. Higgins allows Karpathy to dance with Eliza.<ref>The original book of the musical, and original productions, placed the ball scene at the end of Act I. Some later productions have moved it to the beginning of Act II.</ref>