Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to. Here's the thing,
Speaker 1: My chance to talk with artists, policymakers and performers, to
Speaker 1: hear their stories. What inspired their creations, what decisions changed
Speaker 1: their careers, what relationships influenced their work. Julie Andrews. There's
Speaker 1: a genuine look of surprise on Julie Andrew's face when
Speaker 1: she hears her name called. She did not expect to
Speaker 1: win the Oscar for Best Actress for Mary Poppins. She
Speaker 1: takes a moment to collect herself and makes her way
Speaker 1: to the stage. I know you Americans, famous to your hospitality,
Speaker 1: but this is really ridiculous. The year was This milestone
Speaker 1: came early in Julie Andrew's career. She followed that extraordinary
Speaker 1: success with another one, The Dog Bites When the Beasts.
Speaker 1: When I'm feeling sad, simply remember my cater things and
Speaker 1: then I don't feel so. Julie Andrews has performed in
Speaker 1: dozens of film, stage and television roles, but it was
Speaker 1: those two Nanni's Mary and Maria who captured our hearts
Speaker 1: and transformed her life. Today, she'll tell us what happened before, during,
Speaker 1: and after those performances. So let's start at the very beginning,
Speaker 1: a very good place to start. When I was about seven,
Speaker 1: my mother had remarried and my stepfather was a fine tenor.
Speaker 1: My school had closed due to the escalation of World
Speaker 1: War two, and everything was shut down. And I would
Speaker 1: imagine that partly because I was underfoot a lot and home,
Speaker 1: but secondly, maybe in an attempt to get a little
Speaker 1: closer to this new step daughter that was not very
Speaker 1: fond of him, he decided to just, for no reason
Speaker 1: at all, just give me some singing lessons. And to
Speaker 1: my mother and stepfather's surprise, I had this freak very strong,
Speaker 1: very very huge, ranged voice. It was very thin and white,
Speaker 1: but I could do all the history on it, so
Speaker 1: I could do anything. I hated those singing lessons because
Speaker 1: it was a stepfather with him, he was your instructor. Well,
Speaker 1: he gave me some scales and a few things like that,
Speaker 1: but very quickly after that he found a phenomenal teacher
Speaker 1: of a lady that was dramatic soprano, who was as
Speaker 1: wide as she was short, and was as loving and decent,
Speaker 1: and until she died, which was in her somewhere in
Speaker 1: her nineties, had the most beautiful pitched voice and could
Speaker 1: still sing. And she gave me the foundation that that,
Speaker 1: in other words, hang onto your words, um enunciate because
Speaker 1: they'll pull the song through for you, and all of that.
Speaker 1: And was she someone who you maintained any kind of contact. No, No,
Speaker 1: she was my teacher for most of her remaining life.
Speaker 1: I've worked with other people since, but that lady was, oh,
Speaker 1: my teacher. She prepared me for my Fair Lady and
Speaker 1: became successful. Yes, she always wished, I think that I
Speaker 1: could become a light opera singer or or an opera singer.
Speaker 1: And I knew, in spite of her ambition for me,
Speaker 1: that I didn't have the voice for it. It was
Speaker 1: too light a voice and as I say, it was
Speaker 1: a little white and sound. So I didn't have the
Speaker 1: chops for opera maybe light opera. And I have recorded
Speaker 1: a couple of old recordings of like Rose Marie, and
Speaker 1: I've sung things from The Merry Widow and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: But when the world opened up because I was in musicals,
Speaker 1: I realized that I had found the exact wait for
Speaker 1: my voice, that I had found the right thing. Did
Speaker 1: you study acting as well at the same time, Well,
Speaker 1: my mother occasionally put me with the teacher that was
Speaker 1: local from my hometown, and I was awful and mortified
Speaker 1: because I knew I was at warfful And actually most
Speaker 1: of my training until very much later in my life
Speaker 1: when I got a coach for films and things like that,
Speaker 1: most of it was just doing it and learning, and
Speaker 1: thank god it was Broadway first. No no formal acting training.
Speaker 1: My background was Vaudeville. I was from the wrong side
Speaker 1: of the tracks. I envied all those legitimate actors like
Speaker 1: Gilgood and Olivier and so many of them that that
Speaker 1: just managed and were terrific. And here I was. All
Speaker 1: I knew was how to belt out a song all
Speaker 1: around England when you were doing this a ville work
Speaker 1: in London, musical all over the England, all over England
Speaker 1: before you headed to Broadway. Did you bump up against
Speaker 1: those people, the gil Goods and the Yes, I did,
Speaker 1: But more the people I really bummed up against were
Speaker 1: the great comedians of the day from England. I mean,
Speaker 1: I learned so much just watching and being in those
Speaker 1: rather lunatic reviews. All you know and and as I say,
Speaker 1: you know one week in each town, but you considered
Speaker 1: yourself a singer, yes, not an actress first and foremost
Speaker 1: a singer. You were a singer. And then what do
Speaker 1: you think that changed? Well, much much later. I realized
Speaker 1: that actually singing is for me all about the lyrics,
Speaker 1: and then if you really care about the lyrics, then
Speaker 1: singing is all about acting. But that didn't come till
Speaker 1: in my mid twenties. Sometimes you did The Boyfriend when
Speaker 1: you were how old? It opened the day after I
Speaker 1: turned and who directed The Boyfriend? A lady, an English
Speaker 1: lady called Vita Hope, who had done it in London.
Speaker 1: Because it came from London, I was asked to come
Speaker 1: to Broadway and I didn't think i'd want to, and
Speaker 1: I was very, very nervous about you know, I had
Speaker 1: a terrible separation anxiety because of all my touring from
Speaker 1: your mother, from my mother and family in general, and
Speaker 1: my brothers. But my dad, my real dad, said, honey,
Speaker 1: you know what you're going for could last two weeks
Speaker 1: and they wanted me to sign a contract for two years,
Speaker 1: and I said eventually, thanks to my dad, who he
Speaker 1: said later it took him all the courage in the
Speaker 1: world to tell me to go because his heart was
Speaker 1: aching in terms of his nerves for me and what
Speaker 1: was I What was I going to do? But he
Speaker 1: encouraged me to take it because it would open up
Speaker 1: my head. And did this woman? Was she helpful to you?
Speaker 1: The director? Yes, she was not well she was, but
Speaker 1: she was very busy putting on the show. And everybody
Speaker 1: else seemed to know, you know, the boyfriends all about
Speaker 1: being very there, even said in the twenties, and all
Speaker 1: the ladies of the show seemed to know how to
Speaker 1: be very camp and very funny. I had not a
Speaker 1: clue because I didn't know. I've never been to acting
Speaker 1: school or anything like that. So I tried emirating them
Speaker 1: for a while. And then what really turned the tide
Speaker 1: was the producer of the show. Did you ever meet
Speaker 1: Si Fuer and Ernie Martin? Do you know? Well? They
Speaker 1: did Can Can and Silk Stockings on Broadway, I mean
Speaker 1: as producers. But c I had this wonderful pont Chanfur
Speaker 1: dismissing everybody and getting in and directing it himself. And anyway,
Speaker 1: the night before we opened, I was trying everything each
Speaker 1: preview night, seeing what am I supposed to be doing here?
Speaker 1: And he took me out to the alleyway behind the
Speaker 1: Hubert and the im Imperial and the Royal theaters. Anyway,
Speaker 1: he we sat on the steps on the iron steps
Speaker 1: in in that alley and he said, you know you
Speaker 1: were terrible last night And I said, yes, I did,
Speaker 1: I know I was. And he said, um, you have
Speaker 1: the possibility of becoming quite good and a big star
Speaker 1: tomorrow if you do as I tell you, and you
Speaker 1: must follow every single thing I tell you. And I
Speaker 1: was so looking for that, you know, rope to hang onto?
Speaker 1: He said, I want you to play Polly Brown as
Speaker 1: if your life depended on it. He said, when he
Speaker 1: breaks your heart, I want you to feel it and
Speaker 1: be it. Forget what everybody else is doing, Forget camp
Speaker 1: be real, best lesson I ever had. And because it was,
Speaker 1: it made sense in my belly somewhere. I made us
Speaker 1: as real as I could on opening night, and it
Speaker 1: indeed made all the difference. And then the next project,
Speaker 1: obviously is who directed that production? Mass Heart, the great
Speaker 1: Heart himself was the director? Oh yes, And what was
Speaker 1: it like for you? I mean, to the extent you're
Speaker 1: going to describe? Number one? Where was hard in his
Speaker 1: career then? And where was Rex in his career. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, Rex was well. Rex was just known everywhere
Speaker 1: and had done a lot of movies and and was
Speaker 1: he was a star, big star, and also difficult, no
Speaker 1: doubt about it. I mean, eventually we did become great friends,
Speaker 1: but it took a long time, and he was so
Speaker 1: fed up with this little argeneue that didn't know what
Speaker 1: the hell she was doing. I knew somewhere, deep deep
Speaker 1: down that if somebody would just spend a little time
Speaker 1: or pay attention, that I knew what I yearned to do,
Speaker 1: but I didn't know how to bring it out. Alec.
Speaker 1: So when they hire, do you what do you think? Uli?
Speaker 1: And yeah, well the Boyfriend was a huge success, and
Speaker 1: it was a one time, you know. I was very
Speaker 1: big on Broadway for one year and then I was
Speaker 1: platform and then I auditioned for Learner and Low, particularly
Speaker 1: Alan Jay Learner who wrote My Fair Lady, and Low
Speaker 1: wrote the music, and they worked with me a little bit,
Speaker 1: but it really was Moss who made me a lasa
Speaker 1: do little. And what he did Rex was demanding, wanted
Speaker 1: all the attention. He'd never done a musical before, and
Speaker 1: I had never acted before, So which one did he
Speaker 1: deal with? Well? Of course he dealt with Rex, who
Speaker 1: was the big, big star. Eventually he got around to
Speaker 1: me and he dismissed the entire company for one long weekend,
Speaker 1: and I remember driving down to the rehearsal and thinking,
Speaker 1: this is a little bit like going to the dentist.
Speaker 1: I may feel better when I'm finished, but it's agony going.
Speaker 1: And he for forty eight hours, just he bullied, he cajoled,
Speaker 1: He showed me. He yelled from the orchestra, stalls you, no,
Speaker 1: not that way. You're playing it like a like a schoolgirl,
Speaker 1: you know, get it. We get down and dirty. And
Speaker 1: I actually threw him. Found Eliza Doolittle and from then
Speaker 1: on I worked and worked and worked, and gradually from
Speaker 1: performing it as you know, every night, it gradually became
Speaker 1: embedded in me. And I think I probably by the time,
Speaker 1: you know, a few months would past and it was
Speaker 1: a huge hit. I was definitely feeling that I could
Speaker 1: be Eliza. When did you feel you one had one
Speaker 1: Rex over? Probably that's a good question. Probably not till
Speaker 1: the London production. He was difficult himself, and I think
Speaker 1: he meant well. He was just very short and short
Speaker 1: tempered and not known for being full of generosity attacked
Speaker 1: and generosity. Now, what I learned on stage with him
Speaker 1: was unbelievable. For example, he had this amazing knack. He
Speaker 1: wasn't musical, but he had a musical ear, not only
Speaker 1: for the music, but for where the audience was that night. So,
Speaker 1: for instance, if somebody would cough, let me say, he
Speaker 1: was saying, you know, Eliza, you shouldn't you shouldn't do
Speaker 1: so and so and so and so. He'd repeat the
Speaker 1: line instinctively because corporate, because he knew it hadn't been
Speaker 1: heard correct, you know fully. So just to stand and
Speaker 1: watch him, I completely sometimes forgot who I was supposed
Speaker 1: to be. Now, when the heart says to you, you're
Speaker 1: playing it like a little school girl, you've got to
Speaker 1: get down and dirty. That becomes a theme in some
Speaker 1: of your work, doesn't it. But more than one man
Speaker 1: has said something along those lines. Well, I do have
Speaker 1: a very squeaky green image, but I don't think you can. Well,
Speaker 1: I think that's simply because if you think about it, Alec,
Speaker 1: here's some Mary Poppins, and followed pretty quickly by the
Speaker 1: Sound of Music, two hugely iconic films about pennies of
Speaker 1: all things, and they're so successful that people only remember
Speaker 1: the things that that are the most successful. You know,
Speaker 1: if you think of someone like Clark Gable, you think
Speaker 1: of Gone with the Winds, and you forget the other things.
Speaker 1: And I knew, I think because of all those Vaudeville years.
Speaker 1: There was a lot of down and dirty in Vaudeville.
Speaker 1: I mean, the comedians were blue and body, and it
Speaker 1: was a tough existence. It wasn't a fairy land by
Speaker 1: any means. It wasn't a fairy tale when you're raised
Speaker 1: during the wartime, and your career in music halls is
Speaker 1: during the wartime, And and you and I have this
Speaker 1: in common, where you grew up in a very financially strapped,
Speaker 1: very strapped the money pressures constantly. Things begin to change
Speaker 1: for you after my fair lady, a lot. And do
Speaker 1: you find that that was painful for you? Know? I
Speaker 1: tell you what. First of all, what what immediately springs
Speaker 1: to mind is that I ached that I couldn't bring
Speaker 1: every member of my family with me. Did you feel
Speaker 1: that too? Well? I wanted to help as many people
Speaker 1: as I could, Yeah, and still do, but but to
Speaker 1: change the way my life had been changed miraculously, it
Speaker 1: seemed I wanted to do that for the entire family
Speaker 1: and make them feel better and be better. But when
Speaker 1: you do My Fair Lady on Broadway, than you went
Speaker 1: to London. After that, you're married at the time I
Speaker 1: was married. During the London production, you got you got
Speaker 1: married when you went back, when I went back, when
Speaker 1: you went back, so you're back home, you're married. And
Speaker 1: then what happens. Um, what happened was that right after
Speaker 1: I'd finished in London and I was about, as you know,
Speaker 1: I did three and a half years in My Fair Lady,
Speaker 1: and that's a marathon too on Broadway and eighteen months
Speaker 1: in London, and that is an alan Jay Learners said
Speaker 1: that he thinks that an actress can learn more by
Speaker 1: playing one role in a long run than by playing many,
Speaker 1: many roles in repertoire. Well, the thing being, he said,
Speaker 1: you test every night with the same role, whether you
Speaker 1: can get a laugh, or whether you can do it
Speaker 1: better or and he was pretty right about that. I
Speaker 1: didn't think it would be right, but it was. You know,
Speaker 1: you'd know if it didn't work one night, and then
Speaker 1: you'd work on it and work on it and try,
Speaker 1: and you found out everything you needed to find out
Speaker 1: about how to play, I mean, in a long run,
Speaker 1: how to play with an audience when it's raining outside,
Speaker 1: or when you're leading man has got a terrible cold,
Speaker 1: or when it's up to you to take up the
Speaker 1: reins for a night or two because he's feeling down,
Speaker 1: or when an understudy goes on, or I mean just
Speaker 1: about every situation in the theater in the long run,
Speaker 1: you you experience. But when I think, one of the
Speaker 1: first things that I felt, just to digress for a moment,
Speaker 1: was the relief of knowing that at some point in
Speaker 1: my life, probably during my Fair Lady in London, I
Speaker 1: realized that I probably would never have to go back
Speaker 1: to vaudeville again. I mean landladies and touring and endless,
Speaker 1: I mean with the terrible digs that one had when
Speaker 1: one was touring around one endless, touring in very tacky shows.
Speaker 1: And I knew I could do something better. But the
Speaker 1: voice held me up for so long, the freaky voice
Speaker 1: that I had. And then, as I say, gradually, gradually
Speaker 1: the voice became less white and more vibrant because I
Speaker 1: was growing up and all of that, and as I say,
Speaker 1: I found my level when it came to musicals. What's
Speaker 1: your parents view at that point? Where does that begin
Speaker 1: to change? Now you're something? Yeah? How did they handle that?
Speaker 1: It was very complicated because stepfather was an alcoholic. Mom
Speaker 1: was She was a very warm, passionate lady. But on
Speaker 1: the one hand she was thrilled for me, and on
Speaker 1: the other it was always, you know, don't you dare
Speaker 1: show off and don't you dare do this? And then
Speaker 1: the next minute it was I want you to wear
Speaker 1: your fur coat to the pub tonight, you know that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. And but really, about a year after
Speaker 1: Fair Lady, I was asked to do Camelot and I
Speaker 1: knew I was going to do Camelot in New York,
Speaker 1: in New York, and were you looking forward to going
Speaker 1: back to New York? It was when I got there
Speaker 1: it was better. I'm not sure that going there, I
Speaker 1: mean again, it meant leaving family. And also because I
Speaker 1: do love my home country. I love England, Oh my god. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I feel this is so corny. I feel this
Speaker 1: huge um. I feel it's my job too to be
Speaker 1: the woman one that is the hands across the water.
Speaker 1: I want to bring England to America, and I want
Speaker 1: to bring America to the English somewhere mid Atlantic. We
Speaker 1: we we can split the difference. But it felt very
Speaker 1: important to speak for my country. And also because the
Speaker 1: Americans have been so generous to me for so long.
Speaker 1: We were in this timeline that we're tracking, it's about
Speaker 1: to get a lot more generous. So you go do Camelots.
Speaker 1: Well wait, but then I felt that I needed to
Speaker 1: explain that to the British, and it's say, look how
Speaker 1: wonderful they are, you know, because the British can be
Speaker 1: a bit snobby. So anyway, as I say, I do
Speaker 1: love my country, and leaving mostly leaving it because of
Speaker 1: my family issues which were difficult and complicated. Um, and
Speaker 1: then going back once I got back, m a lot
Speaker 1: was a joy with Richard Burton. And that wasn't three
Speaker 1: and a half years, No, it was eighteen months. Another longest.
Speaker 1: He did it for a year and then he went
Speaker 1: off to do it Cleopatra. Yeah he did it. I
Speaker 1: think it was a year. I was left behind. The
Speaker 1: shows are here, not at first. This is what's so interesting.
Speaker 1: Coming after My Fair Lady written by Learner and Lowe
Speaker 1: who wrote My Fair Lady, the world expected another My
Speaker 1: Fair Lady, and because Alan was not very well. Alan
Speaker 1: Jay Lerner and Moss was not very well. He always
Speaker 1: had heart problems and there just wasn't nothing quite went right,
Speaker 1: and we didn't have enough time to work on it,
Speaker 1: and so on, and we opened on Broadway to Richard
Speaker 1: got us through. I think Richard Burton, you know, everybody
Speaker 1: we were. We had a solid booking for at least
Speaker 1: three months or six months because of Richard, and it
Speaker 1: was a glorious looking show, but it did have floors.
Speaker 1: Moss said, I'm going to go and I'm going to
Speaker 1: take a vacation, but I will come back, as did Alan,
Speaker 1: And they came back as they promised in three months
Speaker 1: and reworked the show, at which time we went onto
Speaker 1: the Ed Sullivan Show. And in those days, said Sullivan
Speaker 1: was huge, as you know, he brought the Beatles and
Speaker 1: so many people to prominence in America. And what they
Speaker 1: did instead of just having us on his show, he
Speaker 1: did a complete excerpt from Camelot. Yeah, I think it
Speaker 1: was at the instigation of Alan and Moss, but we
Speaker 1: did the first act, which was like a little mini
Speaker 1: play all by itself, the following morning after the Ed
Speaker 1: Sullivan Show. The cues around the block, whereas if we'd
Speaker 1: been a standing room only hit. And from then on
Speaker 1: Camelot became a hit. When Camelots over, Where do you
Speaker 1: go to Hollywood? Because because Walt Disney came to see
Speaker 1: I mean, in between I did television shows and my
Speaker 1: Wonderful Fun shows with Carol Burnett and things like that.
Speaker 1: But basically chronologically, Walt Disney was advised to come and
Speaker 1: see Camelot because there was a girl in it that
Speaker 1: might be good for Mary Poppins, none of which I knew.
Speaker 1: And that he came backstage to say hello, I just
Speaker 1: thought he was being very civil, that he was going
Speaker 1: to say hello to me and to Richard and that
Speaker 1: would be that. And you know, everybody knew Walt Disney
Speaker 1: was in the audience, but he came, and he's chatted
Speaker 1: in my dressing room with me and with Tony Walton,
Speaker 1: my then husband, and he said, I wonder how you'd
Speaker 1: feel if you came out to Hollywood, you know, hear
Speaker 1: the songs and see the drawings that we've done story
Speaker 1: boarding as they called it, for Mary Poppins. And with
Speaker 1: huge regret, I said, oh, mister Disney, I would love
Speaker 1: to what I have to tell you that I'm three
Speaker 1: months pregnant, and he said, well, that's all right, we'll wait.
Speaker 1: And of course I did not know the pre production
Speaker 1: and all of those. I mean, it's endless in a
Speaker 1: fairly big movie, as you know. So we went on out.
Speaker 1: Disney was delightful and spoiled us both wonderfully. Hearing the
Speaker 1: songs for Mary Poppins, it instantly evoked those vaudeville days,
Speaker 1: the rumpty tomb kind of quality of jolly holiday familiar
Speaker 1: to you, Arry, and I knew I could embrace it.
Speaker 1: Not only that, but he had Tony on the spot
Speaker 1: when he saw his portfolio, and he commissioned Tony to
Speaker 1: do all the costumes for the movie, which is incredible
Speaker 1: if you think about it, and the sets for Cherry
Speaker 1: Tree Lane and the interior of the Bank's household. And
Speaker 1: Tony got nominated for an Academy Award first time out,
Speaker 1: first film. Amazing that it was Walt's talent too, He
Speaker 1: had such a talent for spotting talent in a way.
Speaker 1: What was representation for you like back then? Which is
Speaker 1: an odd question, meaning he had British agents? Did you
Speaker 1: finally Hollywood agent from handling your career? Well? From the
Speaker 1: time I was about thirteen and starting off in show
Speaker 1: business in England. I was handled by an American gentleman
Speaker 1: who lived in England and who had kind of made
Speaker 1: his bass in England. He was a good agent, but
Speaker 1: his name was Charlie Tucker, and he was a very
Speaker 1: kindly nice guy. And all through my teens and all
Speaker 1: through um My fell lady and boyfriend and Camelot, I
Speaker 1: was represented by him. But there came a time when
Speaker 1: well one or two things caused of falling out between us,
Speaker 1: and then I when I went to Hollywood, ultimately, probably
Speaker 1: around the time of the Sound of Music, I did
Speaker 1: change my age. When you're out there, it does help
Speaker 1: to have a native He was so used to the
Speaker 1: English scene, and you're right, it does help to have
Speaker 1: a native there. You go out there and you start
Speaker 1: shooting when your daughter's how old, She's only like three
Speaker 1: or four months old. When we began rehearsals, and we
Speaker 1: in California, in California on the back lot of the
Speaker 1: Disney who directs the film, Robert Stevenson, and one of
Speaker 1: the good true Disney h stable of direct table of directors.
Speaker 1: That's a very nice way to put it. And how
Speaker 1: did he compare to your other experiences in the theater. Well,
Speaker 1: it was film technical, very different, and he taught me
Speaker 1: a greatly, was very patient and and I quickly, you know,
Speaker 1: I very soon realized the patients that's needed to make
Speaker 1: a movie. And you'd sit around for ages, particularly with
Speaker 1: Mary Poppins, because all of those special effects took such
Speaker 1: a long time to set up, you know. And did
Speaker 1: you begin as as many people do, I think, who
Speaker 1: have the success you've had, did you begin to, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of feel your way towards your own relationship with
Speaker 1: the camera. Yes, well, at first I was very well
Speaker 1: guided and very well looked after, and I always have been,
Speaker 1: to be truthful. Robert Wise was with a great mentor
Speaker 1: in that respect. But the man who taught me about lenses,
Speaker 1: and I wish I had paid even more attention a
Speaker 1: dumb girl that I was at the time, was Hitchcock.
Speaker 1: I said, you know, I know very little about lenses
Speaker 1: in my British, vague, innocent way, very green. And he said,
Speaker 1: you don't know about lenses, and you're a woman. Come
Speaker 1: with me, and he spent forty minutes on on drawing
Speaker 1: and showing me that this would this lens would make
Speaker 1: my nose grow much longer than it should, and that
Speaker 1: a lady should never be shot with anything but a whatever. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right, Well thirty five maybe you know something like that.
Speaker 1: Now when so you do Mary Poppins, How long did
Speaker 1: it take you? When Los Angeles? For months and months?
Speaker 1: Quite a long time. And then there's all the post
Speaker 1: production and looping and things like that. But then very
Speaker 1: Dick always the person cast in the film. Yes, he
Speaker 1: was away because he was a big star of them,
Speaker 1: huge yes. Yeah, and dear just darling because it had
Speaker 1: that vaudeville thing. We were both able to literally kind
Speaker 1: of kick up our heels and have fun together. And um,
Speaker 1: he knew his accent was just appalling as a cockney.
Speaker 1: But I could empathize with that because mine was when
Speaker 1: I went out to do Fair Lady, and I had
Speaker 1: to be a cockney and I wasn't very good, but
Speaker 1: I learned in rehearsals for My Fair Lady. Her co
Speaker 1: star Rex Harrison said of Andrew's quote, that girl is
Speaker 1: here on Monday giving the same goddamn performance. I am
Speaker 1: out of the show unquote. Yet, when Harrison accepted his
Speaker 1: Academy Award for the film version. He professed his deep
Speaker 1: love to both Audrey Hepburn and Andrews, calling them two
Speaker 1: fair ladies. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to
Speaker 1: Here's the Thing. Julie Andrews may be known the world
Speaker 1: over for her portrayal of two very proper Nanni's Opposite
Speaker 1: Christopher Plummer in the Sound of Music and Dick Van
Speaker 1: Dyke and Mary Poppins, but her films aren't all so wholesome.
Speaker 1: With her second husband, director Blake Edwards, she made films
Speaker 1: like Victor Victoria, but even early on she did a
Speaker 1: film that challenged her squeaky clean image. Seems I don't
Speaker 1: mind making enough to a scoundrel, but I I think
Speaker 1: it indmorrow to marry one. The Americanization of Emily was
Speaker 1: a comedic war drama and also a love story. Although
Speaker 1: I've always felt that I wasn't the perfect girl for
Speaker 1: that role, I am so glad that I made that
Speaker 1: movie because it did stop to some degree that very
Speaker 1: Sacharin image that I was getting in Americanization of Emily.
Speaker 1: So there's no music, and you're not this squeaky clean woman.
Speaker 1: You're a woman well trying to be. You're you are,
Speaker 1: take my word for you're a woman, and you're a
Speaker 1: glamorous leading lady in this wonderful film with Jim Garner.
Speaker 1: Did you find you were just as comfortable? Did you
Speaker 1: miss the music? Did you think? I didn't miss it?
Speaker 1: But I have to say that ultimately, the music in
Speaker 1: a musical makes to me a vast difference. I mean,
Speaker 1: I made many musicals after that, and the joy of
Speaker 1: doing the film with music on screen is just well,
Speaker 1: it's you're filled. I mean, think of it. You know,
Speaker 1: whenever there's a a huge orchestration and a wonderful song,
Speaker 1: you're just filled. I don't sing, and I don't do musicals,
Speaker 1: but i'd say with with comedy, people say, what's the difference,
Speaker 1: I say, well, and I would imagine it's the same
Speaker 1: with the musical, where a musical or a comedy it's fun,
Speaker 1: and then a drama is challenging. Blake used to say
Speaker 1: that doing a comedy is far harder than doing a
Speaker 1: huge dramatic role because you never know if people will
Speaker 1: think it funny. But that's speaking from his rito's point
Speaker 1: of view, as well as well as being a direct
Speaker 1: So when you're done with americanization and Emily where you
Speaker 1: go h then to the sound of music, you come
Speaker 1: back to do sound of music? And when does the
Speaker 1: Oscar for Mary Poppins coming before? During the sound of musical?
Speaker 1: So you're shooting sound of music. Yes, you're shooting the
Speaker 1: next movie. It's going to be the next big thing
Speaker 1: stone in your career without you win the Oscar. And
Speaker 1: when you win the Oscar, give us just one sense
Speaker 1: of how you felt when you won. Actually I felt,
Speaker 1: you know, how old were you when you won an
Speaker 1: Academy award? Oh god, you had to ask a young woman,
Speaker 1: maybe thirty? I honestly don't know. Was I by my calculation,
Speaker 1: thank you not even thirty years old? And you win
Speaker 1: an Academy back then, which was which was hard back then? Well,
Speaker 1: here's the thing, I felt somewhat unworthy of it. And
Speaker 1: I'll tell you why, because there was such a sort
Speaker 1: of building outrage that I hadn't gotten the part of
Speaker 1: my fair Lady on film that I thought my Oscar
Speaker 1: was a token of you know, our poor kid, Well,
Speaker 1: let's give her the oscar. There was compensatory commit exactly,
Speaker 1: and I felt it was almost ridiculous, and I didn't
Speaker 1: show it for many years. So when you went back
Speaker 1: to the set of the Sound of Music, I'm just
Speaker 1: curious if everybody, you know, if you had a bigger
Speaker 1: trailer that you want to change. No, I don't think
Speaker 1: so things change for you. Well from then on, with
Speaker 1: the success of Poppins, and particularly after the Sound of
Speaker 1: Music was made, then it was probably one of the
Speaker 1: busiest times in my life because then, as you well know, Alec,
Speaker 1: then you get the press agent, and you get a manager,
Speaker 1: and you get this and you get that, and everybody
Speaker 1: wants to know a piece about you very often, not
Speaker 1: not always certainly, but from my vantage point, musicals are
Speaker 1: shot a certain way, with a kind of kinetic energy
Speaker 1: to the camera and so forth. And what I love
Speaker 1: and what I always noticed about Sound of Music when
Speaker 1: I see it periodically, is that Robert wy shot it
Speaker 1: like a drama. Yeah, it's beautiful shop It's one of
Speaker 1: the most beautiful. It's one of the Yeah, it is
Speaker 1: one of the last of the really great Hollywood musicals.
Speaker 1: The technicians, the people who built it, the people like
Speaker 1: Seven Brides, I mean beautiful photography, yes, exactly. What was
Speaker 1: wise like he was kind patient, endlessly patient. He had
Speaker 1: a watch, a fob watch, which he took out and
Speaker 1: rubbed like one of those stones that you were, you know,
Speaker 1: like a stone that's comforting. But he taught me a lot,
Speaker 1: taught me to be still on film, because you know,
Speaker 1: when you're quiet, yes, and hugely in close up, if
Speaker 1: your eyes are darting from yours come to you. Well,
Speaker 1: I don't know about that, but he did say, just
Speaker 1: chill down in a way, you know, and and he
Speaker 1: was not chilled down, just be still. And but then
Speaker 1: he let me also do the things that I felt
Speaker 1: I wanted to do, like the thrill or the excitement,
Speaker 1: or the fact that Captain Montrap wanted me to stay
Speaker 1: and that that kind of just bubbles up and he
Speaker 1: let that happen. There is such a bad boy quality
Speaker 1: to Chris. Yeah, he's such a bad I mean because
Speaker 1: he's so bad, but he's the greatest. I worshiped Chris,
Speaker 1: and I did a television movie with him. I'll never forget.
Speaker 1: I go see him do king Lear at Lincoln Center
Speaker 1: and a bunch of us go downstairs to his dressing
Speaker 1: room and he's in the big star dressing room at
Speaker 1: Lincoln Center and we're waiting in this ante room and
Speaker 1: he comes out his hair slicked back. He just took
Speaker 1: a shower at he has a bathrobe on and he
Speaker 1: has a little cravat around his neck. And he walks
Speaker 1: up to him He's just done lear for three hours
Speaker 1: and he walks up to us just like he had
Speaker 1: been playing tennis. He said, anyone like a sherry. It
Speaker 1: was all like, now we're gonna have a party in
Speaker 1: my dressing. He is just incoorageable. He is. And you know,
Speaker 1: for a long time he put down the Sound of Music.
Speaker 1: He thought that he was doing something that he shouldn't
Speaker 1: be doing. But later he really acknowledges what it means
Speaker 1: to people. Well, yes, not only that, but what it meant,
Speaker 1: not to his career, but to him as a human being.
Speaker 1: He realized that he could give so much pleasure that
Speaker 1: you know, and that's a huge, huge lesson. Do you
Speaker 1: have a favorite musical number from Sound of Music? That's hard.
Speaker 1: I do have a song that's my favorite, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't mine. It was Edelweiss. I'll tell you why Richard
Speaker 1: Rodgers had this phenomenal gift for writing, utter simplicity. Think of,
Speaker 1: oh what a beautiful morning, you know, da da da
Speaker 1: da da daddy um. Now reverse it da da da
Speaker 1: da da da um. You know, totally simple, but with
Speaker 1: a wonderful lyric, it becomes a magical song. And oh
Speaker 1: what a beautiful morning was like that, and Edelweiss was
Speaker 1: like that, utterly simple, and I suddenly realized that it's
Speaker 1: about anybody's homeland, not just about Austria's. Austria being the
Speaker 1: homeland for this particular movie must have done something good?
Speaker 1: Is my favorite? Is it? Really? It was one of
Speaker 1: the last songs that were written and I think, beautifully
Speaker 1: photographed moment and oh yeah, and that that is phenomenal
Speaker 1: my favorite. Yeah, Oh my god, I wish I had
Speaker 1: hours and hours to tell you something because because we
Speaker 1: get the love story and the singing in your films. Yes,
Speaker 1: where in this period of time does your first marriage end?
Speaker 1: Probably what film or afterward film, towards the middle of
Speaker 1: the sound of musical music that affect your work in
Speaker 1: the film. It made me very sad, very sad, because
Speaker 1: I didn't want it. It's interesting. I only asked it
Speaker 1: because it's interesting how you see, you're watching the film
Speaker 1: and this is what that person is going through location
Speaker 1: and being lonely, and but also you know, I had
Speaker 1: my beautiful daughter, and what was I doing her of that?
Speaker 1: It wasn't that there was anybody else or anything like that.
Speaker 1: It was just it was just Tony and I woul
Speaker 1: have remained, thank God friends to this day. He is
Speaker 1: my one of my dearest friends and always will be.
Speaker 1: And we both feel that way. This is the same
Speaker 1: thing about you, does he? Of course? I mean, he's
Speaker 1: so amazingly talented. Now what was it like to work
Speaker 1: with Hitchcock? You've been dying together? Because people always say
Speaker 1: to me, you know, well, what is something in your
Speaker 1: career that you that excites you? When I say, not
Speaker 1: a whole lot in terms of making movies, because what
Speaker 1: I wanted to do. You know, if if I had
Speaker 1: a wish, I'd rather make a movie with Bogard or Hitchcock.
Speaker 1: Know that that kind of thing. Hitchcock was lovely. He
Speaker 1: was a little dismissive of the script, a little dismissive
Speaker 1: of his actors, because that was his reputation. It was
Speaker 1: a little taciturn no no more. In Hitchcock's mind. He'd
Speaker 1: already conceived, almost shot the film. So that's true that
Speaker 1: the pre production to him was it was far more important,
Speaker 1: and once he conceived his shots, he felt that the
Speaker 1: rest was all just you know, the actors that will
Speaker 1: do their thing and I know what I want. For him,
Speaker 1: it was about audience manipulation and also you know, he
Speaker 1: would say to me, come and look at what I've done.
Speaker 1: I've made a Mandreal he would say, Montreal painting. And
Speaker 1: he would make me look through the camera and indeed
Speaker 1: the background and two faces very close together, and then
Speaker 1: in the background this wonderful red white and pastel coloring.
Speaker 1: And he said, isn't that a Maundreal back And I said, yes,
Speaker 1: indeed it is. Thank god, I knew what he was
Speaker 1: talking about. Having been married to Tony Walton, he loved
Speaker 1: doing things like that. That turned him on. And then
Speaker 1: he did love his leading ladies. He did power was
Speaker 1: he with Newman, very sweet, very sweet and and he
Speaker 1: but but as far as the script was concerned, he said,
Speaker 1: say anything you want, because we would say that's a
Speaker 1: little bit. We'll say what you feel like. I don't care.
Speaker 1: One felt somewhat abandoned by that. But this was late
Speaker 1: in his career, very late, and when you think about
Speaker 1: the early Hitchcock movies. They were written by phenomenal talents.
Speaker 1: Some of you think of the Bergmann films or that
Speaker 1: that he did, or just any of them, you know,
Speaker 1: with Jimmy Stewart and so on. But this wasn't. This
Speaker 1: wasn't as exciting a movie. But he was far far
Speaker 1: more interested when I knew him, in making the audience
Speaker 1: so scared and then suddenly laughing to work with for
Speaker 1: you lovely, Yeah, Oh he was the he was. He
Speaker 1: He coined a phrase about me which did my career
Speaker 1: a great deal of good. He said, She's the last
Speaker 1: of the really great broads, he said, and it's stuck,
Speaker 1: Thank Heaven's And boy did that help at that time.
Speaker 1: I can tell you, well, you and he have something
Speaker 1: in common, which is that f after you become incredibly famous,
Speaker 1: you don't stop seeking, you don't stop trying. You know.
Speaker 1: Newman's greatest performance comes years later in his career when
Speaker 1: he does to the Verdict. Where did you meet Blake? Um? Well,
Speaker 1: we were ships that past in the night, ten years
Speaker 1: before we really met, just at a party, that's all.
Speaker 1: But truthfully, Um our first meeting was in the middle
Speaker 1: of Sunset Boulevard on the Meridian. There was a gap
Speaker 1: on Roxbury, and if you wanted to cross over to
Speaker 1: go down Roxbury, then the traffic was bad. You had
Speaker 1: to stop in the Meridian. And I found, as it
Speaker 1: did Blake, that he was going one way and I
Speaker 1: was going another, and that it happened with a fair
Speaker 1: amount of regularity, that we always seem to stop in
Speaker 1: the Meridian. And so one day after about third time
Speaker 1: or the fourth time, he rolled down his window and
Speaker 1: he said, are you going to where I just came from?
Speaker 1: And he was in therapy and I was beginning my therapy,
Speaker 1: and I said, yeah, I mean different analysts, but they
Speaker 1: were all on rocks, were drive in those days. So
Speaker 1: occasionally we would wave, because by now we knew who
Speaker 1: he was. No, but then very yes, I guess I did.
Speaker 1: I don't know. But very shortly afterwards, really comparatively shortly afterwards,
Speaker 1: I got a phone call saying that Lake Edwards wanted
Speaker 1: to come and see if I to pitch a film
Speaker 1: and see if I'd be interested in it. There was
Speaker 1: some dickering about did I wanted to just meet him
Speaker 1: very in an abstract wade at the Beverly Hills Hotel
Speaker 1: and just have a coffee, very formal, and he said, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I'll just come to you. It's not going to be
Speaker 1: that long. And my family was staying with me at
Speaker 1: the time. My mom and my stepfather were visiting. At
Speaker 1: the end of the time that Blake and I spent
Speaker 1: together that evening, when he came and told me the
Speaker 1: story and asked if i'd like to do it, I
Speaker 1: knew that I wished he would stay for supper. In fact,
Speaker 1: I asked him to and he said I would love to.
Speaker 1: And he told me afterwards that he really would have
Speaker 1: loved to stay for supper, but he had an appointment
Speaker 1: and he had to go to, probably a date. I
Speaker 1: don't know, but I did ask him before he left.
Speaker 1: I said, you must forgive me, but I've been so busy.
Speaker 1: I'm not particularly with it in terms of what you've
Speaker 1: been up too lately. And he said, oh, I finished
Speaker 1: a film a little while ago, called What Did You
Speaker 1: Do in the War? Daddy? And I'm having a preview
Speaker 1: of it for some friends next Wednesday. Would you like
Speaker 1: to come? And then I thought, oh, what do I do?
Speaker 1: And I said, finally, yes, I'd like to thank you,
Speaker 1: And apparently he said I laughed so hard during the movie.
Speaker 1: He thought that's the girl for me. And it took
Speaker 1: three almost four years before we were married, but we
Speaker 1: began dating American then, different than British Man. That's an
Speaker 1: interesting question. Yeah, of course they are. Yeah, a little
Speaker 1: more worldly perhaps, or yeah they are I think so.
Speaker 1: Really well, at least give the impression that way. Did
Speaker 1: you find that he was really very keen on working
Speaker 1: with you, He didn't want to work with anyone else
Speaker 1: once he met you, it wasn't hard for him to
Speaker 1: I think that might be true. I certainly he he
Speaker 1: knew me so well, and he knew that way when
Speaker 1: when they meet the woman in their lives, they're like,
Speaker 1: they want you around. I mean, I'm so proud that
Speaker 1: I did do seven films with him, and and some
Speaker 1: of them were just such fun s. O B for instance,
Speaker 1: was the most fun making a movie I think that
Speaker 1: I've ever had because William dreston Richard Mulligan and it
Speaker 1: was such a happy come a name and we happened
Speaker 1: to shoot a lot of it on our own property,
Speaker 1: believing or not. And um, but they'd come on the
Speaker 1: days that they weren't called to the set, they'd come
Speaker 1: down and it was like a phenomenal repertory company and
Speaker 1: we just had a ball and it was bleak and
Speaker 1: black and I was poking fun of myself a little
Speaker 1: bit in my image and Blake they had been through
Speaker 1: a huge bad time with Hollywood. He was the bad
Speaker 1: boy of Hollywood and for a while he wanted nothing
Speaker 1: to do with it. And that's when we went to
Speaker 1: live in Switzerland for a while, and then he wrote
Speaker 1: his demons out in this Now who wrote the screenplay
Speaker 1: for Effective Victoria? Bake adapted from for the film for
Speaker 1: the for the music, right, he want the screenplay for
Speaker 1: the for the Yes he did. Now, when you do
Speaker 1: the ones like Darling, Lily and and and even Esso,
Speaker 1: b had a very mixed reception from people, when you're
Speaker 1: only the ones that work, do you feel it? Because
Speaker 1: because Victor Victoria is one of my favorite movies of
Speaker 1: all time, Robert Preston m yeah, oh god. Well, having
Speaker 1: worked with him also on S O B and then
Speaker 1: to work with him in in Victor Victoria, he was
Speaker 1: fabulous dark man. I mean troubled Preston really, but not
Speaker 1: on the set, Oh my god, in his life, in
Speaker 1: his personal life. I think when you were doing it,
Speaker 1: did you know it was going to be successful? No,
Speaker 1: you didn't know. You never know. I mean, can you
Speaker 1: honestly say that you've made a movie that you know. No.
Speaker 1: I did a movie once and I said to the
Speaker 1: producer we were shooting, and I said, when's the movie
Speaker 1: coming out? He said, we're going to release it for
Speaker 1: Chris December before Christmas. I said, great, because then we'll
Speaker 1: qualify for the nominations for this year because we're gonna
Speaker 1: win everything actor, actress, director, screenplay, best Picture. What happened?
Speaker 1: The thing was just like a just a just a
Speaker 1: bird poop and a bird path, which was just plot.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you something interesting. I had made three films
Speaker 1: before any of them were released. I had done Barry
Speaker 1: Poppin's Americanization of Emily and The Sound of Music. Not
Speaker 1: one of them had yet to be released. They were
Speaker 1: all stacked up, you know, and being in post production
Speaker 1: and all of that. I was having a ball because
Speaker 1: I was just playing at making movies, learning my craft
Speaker 1: a little bit and having a wonderful time. But when
Speaker 1: when you do the movie and the movie is a
Speaker 1: big success, whose idea was it? Many years later to
Speaker 1: take it to Broadway, and when you took that shot
Speaker 1: of Broadway, you were thinking about Victor Victoria Victoria on
Speaker 1: the stage. Whose idea was that Blake's? I mean, he
Speaker 1: didn't make anything happen. He had that magic that said,
Speaker 1: how did you feel about playing that? Party? Times terrified,
Speaker 1: But more than anything, I remember driving out of the
Speaker 1: city for a night, we looked back at New York
Speaker 1: City and I said, Blake, do you realize with the
Speaker 1: all those that skyline, we're hoping that what we're doing
Speaker 1: is going to capture that city? He said, I know,
Speaker 1: it's It's terrifying, isn't it. Yes, it is good. It did.
Speaker 1: But the day that we opened, I began to get
Speaker 1: so nervous and so frightened, and I blinked and got
Speaker 1: quite tearful in the morning and I said, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm really very scared about tonight. And he looked at
Speaker 1: me as if I was an idiot, and he said, well,
Speaker 1: did you expect to feel any other way, darling? And
Speaker 1: I thought, well, no, I guess not. And he suddenly
Speaker 1: made it all all right. You know. The thing about Blake, though,
Speaker 1: is that he could turn adversity into good fortune. Always.
Speaker 1: He lost his leading man on ten and then cast
Speaker 1: of all improbable people Dudley Moore and I was cast
Speaker 1: and I said, Blake, you know my height and Dudley's height.
Speaker 1: Are you sure that we're going to be look romantic together?
Speaker 1: Because it's okay if I'm not in the movie, I'm
Speaker 1: your wife. I'm loving what you're doing. He said, Honey,
Speaker 1: think of think of Frank Sinatra and Nava Gardner. Think
Speaker 1: of Andre Preven and what was so attractive about him.
Speaker 1: They're not huge people, but they're very attractive because they're
Speaker 1: so damn right. And that gave me the motivation for
Speaker 1: my character. When we talk about your career from the onset,
Speaker 1: one of the things that I hear you say again
Speaker 1: and again is how important your family has been to
Speaker 1: you and how lucky I think. And you wanted to
Speaker 1: go back to England and see your mom and your siblings,
Speaker 1: and you would go back to England and you and
Speaker 1: then they come out and you ship them to California
Speaker 1: with you. And now family is a big part of
Speaker 1: your life again. It is because always has been. But
Speaker 1: now the latest of that is your book writing career
Speaker 1: with your daughter Emma. We've had a wonderful writing collaboration
Speaker 1: now for fifteen years, maybe seventeen years to date, we've
Speaker 1: done books together and it's just ongoing and we are
Speaker 1: so happy. Your daughters are pretty tough customer, do you
Speaker 1: think so? She's very smart? Well, that's not tough. It's
Speaker 1: just a good writing partner. She writes better than I do.
Speaker 1: She's a much better writer than I am. And she
Speaker 1: is smart, and she's got the biggest heart of anybody
Speaker 1: I've ever met. She's it's just hugely generous, mind you.
Speaker 1: I have to say I have four other kids as well,
Speaker 1: but they're not all my Emma is my daughter with Tony,
Speaker 1: but I have two stepchildren to adopt to children, and
Speaker 1: we all at one point where we flung them all together,
Speaker 1: and partially thanks to Emma, who was somewhere in the
Speaker 1: middle there, it all worked. It has definitely worked. Julie
Speaker 1: Andrews has made it through some challenging times. There's a
Speaker 1: line in one of her children's books, The Last of
Speaker 1: the Really Great Whangdoodles, that captures her approach. If you
Speaker 1: remain calm in the midst of great chaos, the professor explains,
Speaker 1: it is the surest guarantee that it will eventually subside.
Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to here's the
Speaker 1: Thing