Pygmalion; or, The Statue Fair is a play by William Brough

William Brough (writer)

-Life and works:Brough was born in London, the son of Barnabas Brough , a brewer, publican, wine merchant and later dramatist, and his wife Frances Whiteside, a poet and novelist. He was the brother of writer Robert, actor Lionel and science writer John Cargill Brough...

 that was advertised as a musical burlesque. It was first produced in 1867, and revived in March 1872.

Described as having a complex plot that largely involves changing social status through matrimony, the story revolves around a young sculptor, Pygmalion

Pygmalion (mythology)

Pygmalion is a legendary figure of Cyprus. Though Pygmalion is the Greek version of the Phoenician royal name Pumayyaton, he is most familiar from Ovid's Metamorphoses, X, in which Pygmalion was a sculptor who fell in love with a statue he had carved.-In Ovid:In Ovid's narrative, Pygmalion was a...

, who creates a young lady out of marble and falls in love with her. She is then brought to life through the divine intervention of the Greek Goddess, Aphrodite

Aphrodite

Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation.Her Roman equivalent is the goddess .Historically, her cult in Greece was imported from, or influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia....

. All this is true to the original tale narrated by the fictional hero Orpheus

Orpheus

Orpheus was a legendary musician, poet, and prophet in ancient Greek religion and myth. The major stories about him are centered on his ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music; his attempt to retrieve his wife from the underworld; and his death at the hands of those who...

 as recorded by Ovid

Ovid

Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...

 in Book X of his Metamorphoses.

Unlike the Greek story, which narrative is brief and ambiguous, the living statue has no heart and cannot return the love of Pygmalion, which causes a good amount of drama in the play. Eventually Psyche gives one to her.