- Every day on the set was surreal, you know,
if day one of shooting is you're dancing
with Emily Blunt and imaginary penguins
and then the next week, you're dancing with Meryl Streep,
like it's gonna be a weird couple of weeks.
(dramatic cinematic music)
As I live and breathe.
- I was flying my kite and it got caught on a nanny!
- Mary. - Poppins.
You came back.
- You seem hardly to have aged at all.
- Really?
One never discusses a woman's age, Michael,
I would have hoped I'd taught you better.
- What was your first Disney memory?
- My first Disney memory was my sister and I
were given two VHSs for Christmas,
The Sword in the Stone and Robin Hood
and we watched them like there was no tomorrow,
I must have seen those two films 100 times each.
- Mary Poppins, 100%, first film I ever saw,
it meant so much to me,
it was such a beautiful first film as a child to see,
'cause it had so much wonder in it,
so much magic, so much joy, all of that,
it was really something
that has stayed with me my whole life,
so to be able to direct this film in a full circle way,
it's just sort of surreal to me.
- The movie that really changed my life was Little Mermaid,
I saw it with a friend,
I remember literally feeling weightless,
when Under the Sea began
and I think if I can point to any moment,
that made me want a life in musicals, it was that one.
- Going to the cinema to watch Fantasia as a little girl
and I just remember just being blown away by it
and thinking it was so beautiful and strange
and weird and exciting
and all these dancing elephants everywhere
and what was it, kind of
and I feel like that sort of Disney feeling
is so present in Mary Poppins too,
the kind of the wonder of it and the strange mystery of it.
- I really remember watching Snow White
and the Seven Dwarves and being so terrified,
when the Queen disguises herself as the witch,
she becomes that old crone, - Yes!
- and I just remember being so terrified,
but also completely glued to it.
- First day on set, what was it like?
- The first day on set was the animated sequence,
it was all green screen and so rather overwhelming.
- It was the animation sequence, that we started shooting,
'cause the animators, it's all hand drawn,
needed that material, so.
- It was full of music and full of joy
and Rob Marshall is so awesome,
because he sort of transports you into the world,
'cause he blares the music so loudly from the speakers,
that everyone feels it, you know,
and so everyone was very happy on set,
people were just so happy, the whole crew.
- It was great to start with a musical number,
we started with the musical number, A Cover is Not the Book,
I'll tell you, boy, that was as exciting for everyone,
'cause you're seeing a musical number,
everyone's singing the song, it's infectious on a film set
and I know Emily and Lin were anxious to do it,
because we had been rehearsing it for so long,
they were ready to like put it on its feet.
- What's amazing about Rob is he preps you really well,
he comes from the theater and that was perfect for me,
we had nine weeks of rehearsal,
before we shot a frame of this movie,
so by the time we were on set, we were already a company,
I already knew how to ride a bicycle on cobblestones
and I already knew my dance steps.
- The first day of shooting was the least
- Pleasant. - pleasant.
- It's always hard to start something,
- Yeah. - even though we had
all this wonderful rehearsal.
- [Emily] You felt sort of safe rehearsing it
and then suddenly we're actually required
to do it, - Do it.
- and commit and there was just like, oh, my goodness,
- Posterity, yeah. - how do we do, whoa, wow.
- What was your first impression of Emily Blunt?
- Oh, well, I knew her socially a little bit,
but she's different as Mary Poppins, you know,
it's a different energy and it's a very in charge energy.
She sweeps into that house and she's Mary Poppins,
it's settled, she could not be more generous
and I feel like it was a masterclass in acting,
getting to be with her every day.
- I just remember arriving and hearing Emily Blunt
speak for the first time as Mary Poppins
in a rehearsal and just thinking wow,
she's a badass and she's got it
and she knows exactly what she's doing
and we're all in the safest of hands.
- I remember seeing her in the first scene
and I just, I actually started to cry,
because I thought oh, my gosh, she's already the character,
she's already owning it so early on in the process.
I knew she'd be perfect, I remember afterwards,
I just brought her over and I said,
you're her, you're already her.