Outside Covent Garden on a rainy evening in 1912, cockney flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, meets linguistic expert Henry Higgins. Higgins, in turn, bets with his companion, Colonel Pickering, that, within six months, he could transform Eliza into a proper lady, simply by teaching her proper English. The next morning, face and hands freshly scrubbed, Eliza presents herself on Higgins' doorstep, ready and willing to be turned into a lady.

The backwoods of North Carolina is where Nell lives, all alone. She has her own form of language and no idea of a world beyond her small plot of land. When civilization enters her life, Nell's life will never be the same again.