We’ve been listening to Alfie Boe’s Bring Him Home ever since it (finally) arrived from the UK a week or so ago. One of the songs he covers is “On the Street Where You Live,” a favorite of mine from My Fair Lady.
This evening, after comparing a few versions of the song, Sebastian made the following observation. This might be a romantic song, but if you tried to sing it today, you’d only end up with a restraining order. For those of you unwilling to enjoy a show tune, here are the key lyrics:
I have often walked down this street before;
But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before.
All at once am I Several stories high.
Knowing I’m on the street where you live.
Are there lilac trees in the heart of town?
Can you hear a lark in any other part of town?
Does enchantment pour Out of ev’ry door?
No, it’s just on the street where you live!
And oh! The towering feeling
Just to know somehow you are near.
The overpowering feeling
That any second you may suddenly appear!
People stop and stare. They don’t bother me.
For there’s no where else on earth that I would rather be.
Let the time go by, I won’t care if I
Can be here on the street where you live.
I’ve always thought that Eliza should have chosen Freddy instead of Higgins!
I think the same thing. Higgins is so high up on the asshole-o-meter that he really doesn’t deserve Eliza. In fact, he’s really downright abusive. Come to think of it, the entire musical really just an examination of highly dysfunctional people & relationships.
Here is a more recent song for the stalker playlist…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AlXffy8tO0
I seem to remember Brendan Frasier singing that song to Alicia Silverstone in “Blast From the Past”, and she basically called the mad house on him.
I have to object to characterizing this as a “Stalker” song. This is a song of emerging love, of initial infatuation, of hope for the future.
It’s not the song of a bitter (sorry!) loser.
Before my first child was born, I remember driving up the street to our house and thinking that if we had a daughter, I would sing this song to her.
Well I had a son (followed by another), but I still sang this to them occasionally at bedtime.