My Fair Lady

Rex Harrison made a charmingly rude Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady but the awful reality was shockingly different. According to fellow Holywood legends he ...

His personality never changed and during the filming of Doctor Dolittle in 1967 in St Lucia Harrison was so enraged during a clash over his contract that he moved his yacht to block the cameras. He used to send the wine back from his own cellar and then rip into the butler for serving it to him." However, Eileen Younghusband, who was a Women’s Auxiliary Air Force officer and served alongside the actor said: "He treated us like dirt. It quickly leaked to the press that she was being dubbed and wasn’t ‘really’ singing the part she’d wrested from Julie and for which she was being so highly paid." Andrews was reported to have used a profanity to describe her time with Harrison on Broadway, while he, during their explosive run, once stormed out of the theatre shouting. The actor had had a harder time with Andrews who was more overtly strong-willed. "He was charming and funny and a great raconteur but, Jesus Christ, what he did to people. In fact, Harrison has raged behind the scenes that he was only be paid $250,000, one quarter of Hepburn's fees. He said: "I'd done the show for so long in the theatre with Julie that any new leading lady was going to be a problem. Rex Harrison, who gave one of the most transcendental performances ever, was—and I don’t say this lightly—the most appalling human being I ever worked with. Yet, Harrison was always absolutely convinced that the show, and subsequent film, were all about him. Rex Harrison made a charmingly rude Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady but the awful reality was shockingly different.