Some of you may recall that I recently attended the red carpet premiere of the upcoming movie War Horse. While in New York City for that weekend, I was also treated to other memorable events. On the first night in the city our group attended a showing of the Broadway musical Mary Poppins.
See that picture of the neon sign up there? It says “this is a great show”. That is an understatement, to say the least. The show runs 8 times a week at the New Amsterdam Theatre, with Mondays being a dark day. Our group arrived at the theater, on time – a surprise considering the amount of time we spent sitting in city traffic. While waiting to get in we had some fun with the life size poster. Sadly, the photo that looks like Mary was holding my arm and pulling me along came out too blurry. She must have been flying too fast to get a clear shot, LOL.
Now I haven’t seen anything on Broadway since the 1980s. Part of that is because not all shows interest me, and part of that is because I haven’t had anyone to go with me to the shows that did interest me. I remember seeing Mary Poppins as a child and enjoying it. But truth be told, even as late as five minutes before the curtain rose I wasn’t exactly sure how much I was going to enjoy seeing it on Broadway.
Mary Poppins on Broadway sticks to many portions of the original Mary Poppins, but does have it’s differences. This Broadway show features great acting, dance and music. It contains songs from both the original Mary Poppins as well as new songs that were added. Here’s a short video with pieces of most of the songs in the musical.
The role of Mary marks the Broadway debut for actress Steffanie Leigh. Not only can this woman act, but boy oh boy can she sing! She truly becomes the quirky, fun, smart and magical nanny that is Mary. She does an amazing job in one of my two favorite numbers – Supercalifragilisticexpalidocious.
Can you say that three times fast?
The actor that plays Bert did a great job too. He is Bert. He’s got so much talent – he can act, sing, dance, and even walk on the ceiling! The performance of the song Step In Time is terrific by itself but when Bert went “over the rooftops” I got chills. Check it out. (If you really can’t watch the whole number be sure not to miss what happens at the 5:20 mark in this video.
Isn’t that amazing!
As it turns out, I loved Mary Poppins on Broadway. I found myself clapping along and wanting to tap my feet. The sets were colorful and true to the period of the original movie. The songs were terrific. There were no weak members of the cast in my opinion. All of cast members did a great job, including the children, who are an integral part of the story. There was no spoonful of sugar needed to help this medicine go down. It was a fun to watch “in the most delightful way”, as well as completely wonderful!
Wondering what the other bloggers in our group thought? Here’s thoughts from Lauren, another Lauren, Lolli, Kas, Lori, Liz, Jennifer, Caryn, and Zippy.
Be sure to check back this weekend, I have pictures from a fun backstage tour that we took of the Amsterdam Theatre.
Mary Poppins on Broadway
Mary Poppins on Facebook
Mary Poppins on Twitter
All expenses were covered by Disney & DreamWorks. Please note that as always my opinions are my own, and that the opinions reflected in this post have not been influenced by the sponsor in any way.
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There isn’t anything like seeing a big time play. The last time I went to a big theater was the Pantages in Los Angeles and I saw Annie.
Now that I have checked out the youtube videos, I believe it must have been much better seeing it in person.
Iam alwayx ready to go into NYC for a play–any play in fact.