Doll-A-Day 2019 #17: Mary Poppins Week: Jolly Holiday Edition Mary Poppins

  We conclude Mary Poppins Week today with is doll.

It's Mary herself.

There have been a lot of Mary Poppins dolls,including several Barbie sized dolls. This isn't the Mary Poppins from the same 2007 series as the Banks kids and Bert you saw earlier this week. This Mary,called the Jolly Holiday Edition, was made by Mattel in 1999.

She belongs to Emma. Emma loves Julie Andrews,so it was a natural for her to buy this doll. 

This doll has a special face sculpt made to look like Julie Andrews. The 2007 Mary had the same sculpt,but a somewhat harsher paint job.

This is the Jolly Holiday outfit,from the part of the movie where Mary,Bert, and the Banks children jump into one of Bert's chalk drawings and end up in an animated world.

You can see my post on the children HERE,and the one on Bert HERE.

During their frloic in the land of chalk drawings Mary,Bert,and the animated cast sing "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious". Ken has gone his whole life singing it as,"Super-cali-fragi-list Begets Be-alidocious".  You're killing me, Ken!

The 2007 Mattel Mary Poppins doll also came in the Jolly Holiday outfit,but it was slightly different.

 

I think today's doll actually captured the look of the dress from the film better than the 2007 version.

Her brown hair is done up in a bun.

She has the articulation of standard Barbie dolls of the time, which was only neck,shoulders, and hips,and click bend legs with minimal bending.

Her arms can lift up and down and out to the sides.

 

Her head does tilt though.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She is wearing a peach coloured half slip and underwear under it.

She has peachy coloured high heels and cloth spats.

She's been laying in Emma's room since before she moved out years ago,and she appears to have lost a shoe and collected some crud on her shoe. 

 Her hat is clear plastic with a gauzy bow on the back,and gauzy fabric that ties under her chin.

There are satiny roses glued on the brim,but the real one didn't have any roses.

Her tiny fingerless gloves are sheer too.

Of course she has Mary Poppins' parrot headed umbrella.

More of what you'd call a parasol in this case I guess.

 

The umbrella doesn't actually open.

  As good as this outfit is,this outfit is probably the least accurate to the movie costume than any of the dolls in the 2007 series,other than Mary.

 

It's not bad, but the others were so well done and close to their movie counterparts, that this one pales by comparison.(Mind you,suits would be easier to copy,especially in a small scale.) But they didn't even try with the shoes.

They could have done molded side button shoes,and not tried to get by with faking it with spats. (The 2007 Mary only had white boots.)
   By the way, for you younguns out there,these are spats:

Spats,short for spatterdashes or spatterguards,were worn over shoes to protect them from mud and dirt.

Julie Andrews was born Julia Elizabeth Wells,in Walton-on Thames,in Surrey,England in 1935. At age five Julie moved to London to live with her mother and stepfather,whose last name, Andrews,she took. Her stepparents entertained troops for the Entertainments National Service Association,or ENSA. As a child Julie took voice lessons. From the age of 10 to 12 Julie appeared on stage with her parents,singing solo and in  duets with her stepfather. In 1947,at the age of 12, she made her solo debut. The following year she became the youngest performer ever to perform in a Royal Variety Show,appearing before King George the VI and Queen Elizabeth.
  Julie appeared in musicals in London's West End,the British equivalent of Broadway. In 1954,at age 19 she made her Broadway debut in "The Boyfriend". The following year she was given the starring role of Eliza Doolittle in "My Fair Lady".
  In 1957 Julie released her first solo album, and played 'Cinderella' in the first TV adaptation of Rogers and Hammerstein's musical. Julie was cast as Guinevere in the original Broadway production of "Camelot" in 1960,but lost the role of Eliza Doolittle in the film version of "My Fair Lady" the same year. Producer jack Warner believed Julie wasn't a big enough name to star in a major film. Instead she was cast as Mary Poppins that year. At the Academy Awards the following year, "My Fair Lady" swept the awards,winning Best Director, Best Actor,and Best Supporting Actor and Actress . For all the awards "My Fair Lady" won, they lost two of the biggest awards, Best Picture and Best Actress to "Mary Poppins" and Julie Andrews. In her acceptance speech Andrews thanked,"a man who made a wonderful movie and who made all this possible in the first place, Mr. Jack Warner." Ouch!

In 1964 Julie also appeared in a movie she describes as her favourite film,"The Americanization of Emily",for which she was nominated for a BAFTA,the British equivalent of an Academy Award.

Along with Mary Poppins, Julie's other best known role is as Maria Von Trapp in 1965's "The Sound of Music",still the third highest grossing film ever in America,(adjusted for inflation). "The Sound of Music" is still one of Emma's all time favourite movies. She has the Maria Von Trapp Barbie doll too,but it was made with the standard Barbie face.

Julie has appeared in many movies and TV shows over the years, including several well received TV specials with Carol Burnett. In 1997,during a Broadway run of "Victor/Victoria" Julie developed problems with her voice. She was operated on for removal of nodules on her vocal chords. Following the operation she was unable to sing. She later said that she never had nodules,only 'a muscular striation on the vocal chords'. She sued her doctors in 1999. The case was settled for an undisclosed amount in 2000.  Since then Julie has had four operations to restore her voice. While the raspiness was removed from her speaking voice, her singing ability has never been totally restored.
  In 2000 was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to the performing arts by Queen Elizabeth II.
  Julie may be best known to young audiences as Queen Clarisse Marie Renaldi in "The Princess Diaries",from 2001,(and her first Disney movie since "Mary Poppins"). In 2004 she also appeared in the sequel.

    See you tomorrow for a doll I got for Christmas recently.

Doll-A-Day 2019 #16: Mary Poppins Week: Bert

  We continue Mary Poppins Week with a really great doll.

He's this Bert doll.

The doll is an amazing recreation of Dick Van Dyke,who played Bert in the original 1964 movie.

A Lobby card for "Mary Poppins" showing Dick Van Dyke as Bert and Julie Andrews as Mary.

In that film Dick appeared not only as Bert,but also as the oldest Mr. Dawes.

The Cockney accent used by Dick Van Dyke as Bert is widely regarded as one of the absolute worst accents ever used in a movie. In his defense, Van Dyke claimed his accent coach was Irish, and couldn't do the accent either! He also says no one told him how awful his Cockney accent was at the time.

In the new movie, "Mary Poppins Returns",Dick appears again. This time he plays the youngest Mr Dawes from the original film,(Played by Arthur Malet in that film.), who is now the oldest Mr. Dawes.

Dick Van Dyke recently turned 93,and amazed everyone with his dancing in "Mary Poppins Returns".

This doll was produced in 2007,along with a Mary Poppins doll made to look like star Julie Andrews,and recreations of the Banks children who were made with no attempt at resemblance to the movie actors. You can see those dolls in yesterday's post. In spite of being made in Dick Van Dyke's likeness,the doll is only labelled as 'Bert'.

The boxes displayed the dolls on cardboard carousel horses,to recreate part of the Jolly Holiday sequence from the movie.

Bert is jointed at the neck,but can only turn his head,not tilt it at all.

He has jointed shoulders,and his arms can move out to the sides,as well as up and down.

They could move a lot better, but his long sleeved shirt and his jacket hinder them a bit.

He also has jointed elbows,knees, and hips that can twist, and move from side to side,enabling him to be placed in dance positions.

It's the body that was used on some jointed Ken dolls,including 40th Anniversary Ken,and dolls like Legolas from Lord of the Rings,and Frank Sinatra. (You can see my post on that doll HERE.)

  He has his striped jacket,white shirt,blue bow tie,white trousers,blue socks,white shoes,gloves,straw hat,and cane.

There are some nicely scaled tiny buttons on his jacket.

Bert's shirt has one tiny button too,as do the cuffs of the jacket.

The shirt button is the size of the ones on the cuffs of the jacket,but there is only one. Unfortunately, there is nothing holding Bert's shirt closed except his bow tie. There are no snaps or Velcro,or closures of any kind.

 The shirt has an elastic strap at the bottom that goes across the doll's crotch,to hold the shirt tucked in. His jacket is sewn closed, and it's probably best to keep it that way, since the jacket has only one snap to keep it closed otherwise.

His bow tie is not connected to his shirt,like with a lot of Ken outfits. It's actually a separate piece of clothing. The blue tie is on a piece of circular elastic.

The pants even have little side pockets! Bert can even put his hands in his pockets.

The pockets aren't sewn up though. They are just holes that go all the way into the pants,with no bottoms in them.
The straw boater is nice,but the band is stitched on,and it's placed way too high.

It should be down where the brim starts. This doll's band is trying to creep off the top of the hat.  It's stitched on though, with the stitches that keep the hat on his head. So,unless you want the hat detached,you can't fix the band. The edges tend to droop too.

 Dick Van Dyke was born in West Plains,Missouri in 1925,but,like his character on the Dick Van Dyke Show,grew up in Danville,Illinois. His career started in radio in the 1940's. He also performed for a while in the late 40's as part of a comedy pantomime team called 'Eric and Van,the Merry Mutes'. In the early 50's the Merry Mutes had a TV show in Atlanta,Georgia.
  In 1959 Van Dyke made his Broadway debut. In 1960-61 he starred on Broadway in "Bye Bye Birdie", winning a Tony for Best Featured Actor in 1961. In 1961 Dick moved to TV, starring in "The Dick Van Dyke Show" from 1961 to 1966. During the run of the show Dick won three Emmy awards for his role of Rob Petrie,a character created by Carl Reiner,which Reiner originally meant to play himself. (After the pilot episode,starring Reiner, was not well received,the show was revamped and Dick was given the lead role.)
  While starring in The Dick Van Dyke Show, Dick made several movies,including the film version of "Bye Bye Birdie" in 1963,"Mary Poppins" in 1964,and one of my favourites, a goofy comedy called "The Art of Love", in 1965.
  After The Dick Van Dyke show ended in 1966, Dick starred in 1968's classic "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang",and showed his dramatic talents in the comedy-drama "The Comic" in 1969. In "The Comic" Dick played a silent movie comedian dealing with depression and alcoholism. The role was written especially for Dick by Carl Reiner.

   Dick appeared in more movies, but returned to TV in 1971 in "The New Dick Van Dyke Show". The show ran for three seasons. Dick also starred in a dramatic role as an alcoholic in the TV movie, "The Morning After",earning an Emmy nomination. In 1976 Dick starred in the short,but Emmy nominated, sketch comedy series,"Van Dyke and Company",and was briefly a regular on the final season of "The Carol Burnett Show" in 1977. He returned to his own series in 1993 with "Diagnosis:Murder". The series,which ran until 2001,originated from an episode of the series "Jake and the Fatman" and  several TV movies,in which Dick played Doctor Mark Sloan.
  These days Dick appears with an a capella group, Dick Van Dyke and the Vantastix. He also enjoys working with computer animation. In 2017 he released his first solo album since 1963.

    Tomorrow we'll see the last Mary Poppins doll this week.