How Julie Andrews Embodied SOUND OF MUSIC Role in Real Life
By Movieguide® Contributor
THE SOUND OF MUSIC child stars are sharing what it was like to work with their “nanny,” Julie Andrews.
“[Charmian Carr, who played the oldest von Trapp child Liesl], of course, was older, but for the rest of us being 13 or 14 on down, she helped, I wouldn’t say, keep us in line but corralled us,” said Duane Chase, who played Kurt von Trapp in the movie.
He said that Andrews was “kind of a nanny” and “super nice” to him and the von Trapp kids.
“Oftentimes we’d have breaks in filming, and so we’d all be sitting around on a huge blanket. And we’d be playing cards [with Julie],” he said.
Andrews’ daughter, Emma, “was a baby at the time” of filming and “would be on the blanket with us too,” Chase said. “It would be really fun to see Emma again after all these years.”
She also gave them a sneak peek of a special song she’d sing in MARY POPPINS in the following year.
“She taught us ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,'” said Kym Karath, who played Gretl. “So we were privy to hearing that song before Mary Poppins even came out.”
What Chase “remember[s] most” about working with Andrews was having “all [the child actors] and our mom and dads and other people who worked behind the camera over to her house for an all-day pool party.”
READ MORE: JULIE ANDREWS REVEALS FUTURE OF THIRD PRINCESS DIARIES MOVIE
“I thought that was just really incredibly nice on her part,” he told PEOPLE.
Karath recalled “very fun times” with Andrews “behind the scenes or while we were waiting” for a scene to be set up. “She was really warm, and congenial, and loving, and patient, and very, very sweet. That’s who she is — she’s wonderful. She’s a really wonderful person,” she said.
Nicholas Hammond, who played Friedrich von Trapp, said, “There were no kind of terrible egos. I mean, Julie is the most professional woman alive and it all comes from the top. When the person who has the whole responsibility for the film on her shoulders is behaving so modestly and so quietly and so professionally, everybody else does the same.”
Andrews won a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination for her performance in the classic movie. In 2022, the actress said she does keep in touch with all of the cast “but not on a really regular basis.”
“I mean, Christmases, maybe birthdays, and certainly get-togethers, but we just bonded so hard that I think we’re family anyway,” she said.
READ MORE: HOW JULIE ANDREWS WOULD HAVE ENCOURAGED HER YOUNGER SELF
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