"I'm not doing it," explained Mackintosh, on Nov. 13, the day of the North American non-Equity premiere of his production of Oliver! in Denver. "I can't. I'm working on Mary Poppins with Disney at the moment. If the right theatre had come and we could have cast it there and then, I could have just about done it before I got too involved with Mary Poppins, but I can't now."

Mary Poppins bows in London in December 2004. Mackintosh had previously expressed hope that the Trevor Nunn-directed revival of the Lerner and Loewe classic, My Fair Lady, based on Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion, would come to Broadway in 2004.

"It's a great production, which doesn't date, and at some point in the next two or three years the right pieces will come together [for Broadway]," Mackintosh said.

The London run closed Aug. 30, 2003, at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane after two and a half years of performances.

* "In addition to recouping its entire capitalization in a record-breaking 18 weeks, the production has made profits in excess of £2 million," according to statement made last summer. "Although the Theatre Royal Drury Lane is one of the largest West End houses, this production of My Fair Lady recouped faster than any other show of its size in recent history.

" The show opened in Summer 2001 with advance bookings of £10 million, an all-time record for the West End. Given that it was a revival, the run of two and a half years exceeded all expectations. Plans are now proceeding to take the production to Broadway and Australia."

In the closing announcement, Mackintosh said, "I have been thrilled with the huge success of this production which has run even longer than the first time I did the show in 1978. The current cast has received the best notices yet and consequently I have decided to end the London run on a high, rather than try and recast the show yet again when several contracts run out in the autumn."

The closing cast included Anthony Andrews, Laura Michelle Kelly and Russ Abbot as Prof. Henry Higgins, Eliza Doolittle and Alfred P. Doolittle, respectively.

The Nunn staging won three Laurence Olivier Awards, including Outstanding Musical Production, two Laurence Olivier Awards for Alex Jennings and Joanna Riding as Best Actor and Best Actress in a Musical, the first time in Olivier Award History that two actresses have won the same award for playing the same role in consecutive years.

Choreography and musical staging was by Matthew Bourne, who also created musical staging for Mackintosh's Oliver! in London.

My Fair Lady was produced by Cameron Mackintosh, in association with the Royal National Theatre.