JULIE ANDREWS
THE STAR REFLECTS ON THE IMPACT OF HER LIFE-CHANGING ROLE
The Hollywood icon reflects on her career and Mary Poppins’ enduring legacy.
Julie Andrews was “practically perfect” in 1964’s Mary Poppins — and she earned an Oscar to prove it. But the grande dame of musical movies is sure Emily Blunt, who plays Mary Poppins in the new version descending into theaters in December, will make the role her own. “I admire her enormously,” Julie told Closer at the Raise Your Voice concert honoring the star in New York City on March 5. “It’s a brand-new film based on all of the other stories Walt Disney had in his trunk based on P.L. Travers’ Poppins character,” Julie explains. “It’s wonderful Emily is the new Poppins.”
Looking back on the original, in which she starred with Dick Van Dyke, Julie, 82, marvels, “It was 50 years ago, and that boggles my mind!” The original Poppins, along with The Americanization of Emily and 1965’s The Sound of Music, launched her career. “It was amazing,” she says, in no small part because she’d been hired to do what she loved. “Singing is very, very close to my heart,” she shares. “The giving of that sound… over the years you begin to realize how fabulous [it is that] you can make somebody forget [their troubles].”
Sadly, a spoonful of sugar didn’t help Julie after she had surgery in 1997 to remove nodules on her vocal chords that resulted in the loss of her famed singing voice. “It was devastating,” she says. But the star has gone on to write children’s books, star in The Princess Diaries and last year directed a production of My Fair Lady in Sydney. “It seems [my voice is] not all that I am,” Julie says.
Now she’s looking forward to seeing Mary Poppins Returns — and hearing Emily sing — along with the rest of us. “The gift of voice is not something that should be taken lightly,” Julie says. “It is a gift.” — Lisa Chambers, with
reporting by Jaclyn Roth