I mentioned in a post a few years back that I saw the Mary Poppins movie in 1965, months after it came out, when it finally arrived in my hometown of Richland, Washington. I was in the fourth grade that year, and I went to the movie in the spring of 1965, around the time of my April birthday when I turned nine.
And I had a Mary Poppins themed birthday party that year. I’d received a Mary Poppins doll for Christmas 1964. My mother used the doll to make a Mary Poppins birthday cake for the party—my favorite angel food cake, with the doll stuck in the hole so the cake looked like her skirt. The cake was iced with pineapple and whipped cream frosting to make it resemble a lovely light yellow gown. Mother must have frosted the doll’s top also, because I’m quite sure Mary Poppins would never have appeared in public unless completely dressed.
My mother was a little disdainful of the Mary Poppins movie. She was a believer in the Mary Poppins of the books by P.L. Travers. Mother read several of those Mary Poppins books to my brother and me. The Mary Poppins of the novels was not as pretty as Julie Andrews, and she came across as a little snooty to my young self. She was a stiff-upper-lip nanny, well-versed in discipline beyond a spoonful of sugar, but still given to traveling by umbrella and practically perfect in every way.
Despite the liberties that Walt Disney took with the Mary Poppins character, I adored the movie. The Julie Andrews version of Mary Poppins was a kinder and gentler version of the nanny in the books. Her medicine went down a whole lot easier than the book version Mary Poppins.
I could sing all the verses to all the songs. I later received a book of the music from the movie, and when I was in about the sixth or seventh grade, I learned to play most of the movie’s songs on the piano. “Feed the Birds” is the prettiest song in the movie, and “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” was the hardest for me to play (I’ve always played lento better than allegro). I’ve only seen the movie once in the theater, but I’ve watched it many times on television. I can still sing most of the lyrics, though people watching with me object when I do.
Now I am eagerly looking forward to seeing the new movie, Mary Poppins Returns. I’m hoping I don’t have to wait months to go, as I did for the original. I don’t have any children available to take to the movies with me, but I don’t mind going by myself. I probably can’t get my husband to go with me. After all, he sees himself as practically perfect in every way, and I doubt he wants the competition.
Which movies did you love when you were a child?
Bambi.