Stage Legend Rosemary Harris on Her Lifetime Achievement Tony Award and Why Her My Fair Lady Role is a 'Real Tonic'

Just after her Wednesday matinee performance as Mrs. Higgins in My Fair Lady, Rosemary Harris is seated at her dressing table in the Vivian Beaumont Theater, a picture of calm on a two-show day. Serene and beautiful at age 91, Harris has settled in to chat about her 2019 Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement. In her case, "lifetime" extends all the way back to 1952, when she made her Broadway debut in Moss Hart’s The Climate of Eden. Harris won a 1966 Best Actress Tony for The Lion in Winter and has been nominated eight times since then, most recently for the 2010 revival of The Royal Family. She hasn’t worked much in recent years while caring for her husband, novelist John Ehle, at their home in North Carolina. After he passed away spring, director Bartlett Sher lured the British-born actress back to Broadway. Harris’ date for the Tony ceremony will be her daughter, two-time Tony winner Jennifer Ehle; they famously went up against each other for Best Actress honors in 2000. (Ehle won, for The Real Thing). Surrounded by Mrs. Higgins’ gowns and jewels, plus a display of origami butterflies made by her dresser, Harris shares Tony memories and tidbits from her legendary career.

What was your reaction to winning a Tony for lifetime achievement?
Amazed and thrilled and honored. How often does one get an award for that? Except Nathan Lane—I saw him at the Theatre World Awards on Monday and he said it was the fifth lifetime achievement award he’d gotten this year, so he had to make sure there was a car waiting outside in case he wandered off!

How has your experience been in My Fair Lady?
Oh, I love it. How could you not? It’s a gift. You get beautiful dresses to wear, and a lovely wig and some high heel shoes. When you’ve been Old Mother Slipper-Slopper at home and suddenly you get to put on all this prettiness, it’s a real tonic.

Have you worked at the Beaumont before?
Yes, a long time ago. I did A Streetcar Named Desire here, and The Merchant of Venice [both in 1973]. It was the 25th anniversary of Streetcar and Tennessee used to come to rehearsals.

You played Mrs. Higgins at the Hollywood Bowl in 2003, right?
Yes, with John Lithgow, Melissa Errico and The Who—Roger Daltrey—as Doolittle. A hundred years before that, I was in a little theater company in England, and Jessie Matthews, a star of the 30s and 40s, was going around the country playing Eliza Doolittle [in Shaw’s Pygmalion]. She came to our theater and there was nobody to play Mrs. Higgins, so they put a gray wig on me. I love Shaw [Harris received a 1984 Tony nomination for Heartbreak House]. I wish I had done more. The rhythm is wonderful, and once you have the words in your mouth, he does the work for you.

What’s your routine on a show day?
It’s a mess. When John, my husband, was alive, he had a strict timetable. We would get up at 7:30 every morning and go out to breakfast, and I’d have a little nap in the afternoon if I had a show to do at night. Now, it depends on how well I sleep. I don’t get home until about 12, and it’s about 1 before one gets to bed. I live across town as the crow flies, on 64th Street. I don’t have to walk it, fortunately! There are all these wonderful young men who drive us around.

You look 20 years younger than you are…
Do I?

What’s your secret?
I don’t know. They talk about “Dr. Theater.” Adrenaline is always shimmering around in a theater, which you don’t get so much in normal life unless you’re scared or something goes amiss. Maybe that helps. When I’m not working, I’m down in North Carolina and we have a rather large yard, so I’m usually struggling with vines and pulling things down. I get plenty of exercise in the garden.

Let’s talk Tonys. Is it true there’s a typo on yours?
Yes. I would love to have shown it to you; it’s on my dining room table. It’s not on a stand, because it was before television. It’s a flat round disc, like a paperweight, in a white box on a velvet bed. The engraver got carried away with all the Rs in my name. There are two Rs in Rosemary and two in Harris, and then it says “Dramatic Starr.” There was an R in “Dramatic,” and when he got to “Star” he couldn’t resist putting two Rs. So I’m a Dramatic Star-ruh. It was wonderful to get it. I’m very proud of it.

When you were nominated for Waiting in the Wings and Jennifer was nominated for The Real Thing, were you rooting for her?
Of course. We were rooting for each other, but neither of us thought that the other one was going to win. There was that wonderful actress sitting one row behind us who not only was playing the lead, but she had written the play herself, about Mae West.

Claudia Shear [a double nominee for Dirty Blonde].
Yes. We thought it was a no-brainer that she would get it. We were completely relaxed, and we looked at each other with amazement when Jennifer won. But I’m happy she got it. She now has one for each side of the mantlepiece [Ehle won a second Tony in 2007 for The Coast of Utopia, which played at the Beaumont].

Will Jennifer attend the Tony ceremony with you?
Yes, she’s going to be my date. Isn’t that fun?

What are you wearing?
Maybe I shouldn’t say, but I’m going to wear something very simple. I keep all my clothes from different shows. [With] all the Tony nominations I’ve had, I never expected to win, so I didn’t bother to buy the bottom half of my dress; I used to put my money into a jacket. I figured it didn’t matter what I wore down below because nobody was going to see it. And I was always right.

It’s a tribute to you that Jennifer wanted to follow in your theatrical footsteps. You must be proud.
I am. I was surprised that she wanted to be an actress. I thought she would be a writer because my husband was a wonderful writer and she used to scribble away, writing stories, when she was younger. But one day she said, “Mom, I want to be an actress.” I said, “Why?” and she said, “Well, why wouldn’t I? You have so much fun.” How could I deny that? So, I said, “Go for it.”

Did you expect to be acting at this point in your life?
As long as one’s health hold out, yes. My husband didn’t want to travel so I had to turn things down, but now, alas, I can go anywhere. You never know what’s around the corner. I feel very, very lucky.