Mary Poppins is still regarded as one of the best loved musicals that have ever graced the big screen and this year it celebrates it's 45th birthday.
It's hard to believe that this was one of Julie Andrews' earliest film roles, she did however come from a musical theatre background.
So forty five years after it was released lets take a look at some of the people that made Poppins possible.
1. Dick Van Dyke who played Bert is infamous for his ‘Cockney’ accent, but at the grand age of 83, one of his modern passions is producing 3D computer graphics.
2. Dame Julie Andrews had to wear a wig to play Mary Poppins and had her hair cut short for the role. She kept it that way when she went on to play Maria in the Sound of Music. Dame Andrew is also a successful author and has written under pen names, Julie Andrews Edwards and Julie Edwards.
The actress initially declined the role de to prgnancy but Disney waited for her.
3. Mary Poppins featured two Oscar winners; Ed Wynn played Bert’s ‘laughaholic’ Uncle Albert who entertains Mary Poppins, Bert and the children to tea on ceiling.
He won an Oscar in 1959 for his performance in The Diary of Anne Frank. Veteran screen actress, Jane Darwell won one for her role in the Grapes of Wrath (1940).
5. Jane Darwell also appeared in over 170 films, was living in a retirement home when Walt Disney personally invited her to play the Bird Woman in the film’s ‘Feed the Birds’ number. It was her last screen appearance.
6. Ed Wynn, also made what many might consider a bit of a career-boob in 1939 when he turned down the title role in The Wizard of Oz.
7. Matthew Garber, who played Michael Banks, made only three films all for Disney and died of pancreatitis at the tender age of 21.
8. Karen Dotrice, was eight years old when she played Jane Banks. She’s the daughter of English Shakespearean actors Roy and Kay Dotrice and the god-daughter of Charles Laughton. She later played housemaid Lilly Dawkins in Upstairs, Downstairs in 1975. She made her last screen appearance in 1978 in a BBC2 ‘Play of the Week’ and gave up acting in 1981.
9. Dawes Butler was the uncredited voice of the Turtle and one of the Penguins in the ‘Jolly Holiday’ sequence. He’s best known for providing the voices of dozens of Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters, including Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound, Snagglepus and Quick Draw McGraw.
10. The farmyard pig in the ‘Jolly Holiday’ sequence was grunted by Thurl Ravenscroft, best known as the voice of Tony the Tiger in the Kellogg’s Frosties commercials with his deep, booming, catch-phrase, 'They’re GRRREAT!'
11. The esteemed English actor, David Tomlinson who played Mr Banks, also provided the squawky voice of Mary Poppins’ parrot-headed umbrella.
12. When Glynis Johns aka Mrs Banks was approached to appear in Mary Poppins she thought she was going to be offered the title role. In order to persuade her to take the part of the children’s mother, Walt Disney told Glynis that the composers, Richard and Robert Sherman, had written a song especially for her.
The brothers quickly adapted a song originally written for the character of Mary Poppins and it became Mrs Banks’ song, ‘Sister Suffragette’.
13. James MacDonald was the assistant to conductor Irwin Kostal, was also Disney’s sound-effects wizard and, for many years, the voice of Mickey Mouse.
Mary Poppins is available now on 45th Anniversary Disney DVD.
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