Backstage with Sandy Kenyon: 'Mary Poppins Returns'
NEW YORK (WABC) -- Mary Poppins Returns is not a remake of the beloved 1964 classic, rather a sequel that takes place a quarter century after the original.
In the new film, the two children from the original are fully grown but once again in need of her help.
Emily Blunt is practically perfect as Mary Poppins -- in fact, it's impossible to imagine anyone else doing the role quite as well.
"What I love about the character is that she just renders you helpless but to comply with whatever she wants," Blunt said. "And she is a disciplinarian, and yet she's really eccentric and batty. And so I just really just fell in love. Such a delicious character."
Broadway star and "Hamilton" creator Lin-Manuel Miranda takes on the role of her friend Jack, his first major role on the big screen.
"The hardest part for me, honestly, was that bicycle," Miranda said. "I can ride a bicycle. I'm a New Yorker. I have never ridden a bicycle that old, on British cobblestones, with a ladder, while singing and sometimes having children lying across the back. Any time I'm smiling on the bike, it means I have mastered something very difficult."
Director Rob Marshall was tasked with bringing the classic to life in a new era of film, and he and his team made the canny moves to ensure it was a success.
"My first film that I ever saw as a child was Mary Poppins," he said. "And when I was asked to direct this, I thought to myself, 'You know what? It's so daunting to think of following in the footsteps of that perfect film.' And I really wanted to stay true, as you say, to that film. But also create a new path for this film."
One of the messages of Mary Poppins is that "everything is possible, even the impossible." And the cast and crew proves that true.
"It's so joyful," Blunt said. "I just think that people come out of it in sort of a state of euphoria."
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