Opera Australia and co-producer John Frost have announced that British actor Nathaniel Parker will play Professor Henry Higgins in the upcoming 70th-anniversary season of Lerner & Loewe’s much-loved musical My Fair Lady. This marks the final piece of casting for the production, which will co-star Australian soprano Claire Lyon as Eliza Doolittle.

Nathaniel Parker. Photo © Matt Crockett

Parker is best known for playing the lead in the BBC crime drama series The Inspector Lynley Mysteries and Agravaine de Bois in the fourth series of Merlin.

He won an Olivier Award for his portrayal of Henry VIII in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s 2014 productions of Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, and Tony nominations when the productions moved to Broadway the following year. He was also nominated for an Olivier Award for The Mirror and the Light in 2021, the final production in the trilogy, based on Hilary Mantel’s award-winning novels.

His extensive credits for the RSC include A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Every Man in his Humour, Richard II, The Rover, The Storm and The Winter’s Tale.

Parker portrayed Bassanio in Peter Hall’s 1989 production of The Merchant of Venice in London...