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Sooooooooooooo galore "Mary Poppins" connections.
Unless you're a existent Disney nerd oregon you were live successful 1971 erstwhile Bedknobs and Broomsticks was released, you mightiness not beryllium acquainted with this OG classic.
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The film, starring Angela Lansbury, is astir a witch who takes successful 3 London children during World War II and uses her powers to assistance decision the German Nazis.
Like Mary Poppins, the movie mixes live-action and animation into a whimsical musical.
Walt Disney Pictures/Everett Collection
And similar Mary Poppins' umbrella, Bedknobs and Broomsticks also includes flying household items, successful this lawsuit Miss Eglantine Price's (Lansbury) broomstick, and a levitating furniture for radical question (think of it arsenic a minivan equivalent).
As you tin astir apt imagine, making a half-animated and half-live-action movie successful the 1970s required a batch of ingenuity, and the behind-the-scenes stories are fascinating.
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So, present that the movie is readily disposable connected Disney+, we figured present was the close clip to bash a heavy dive connected the classic movie.
So present are 19 behind-the-scenes fun facts astir the making of Bedknobs and Broomsticks:
1. Bedknobs and Broomsticks isn't based connected 1 book; it's really based connected two.
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The movie is based connected a brace of children's books by British writer Mary Norton. The first, The Magic Bedknob (1943), is astir 3 children who observe their neighbour is simply a witch, who creates a flying furniture for them to question on. The sequel, Bonfires and Broomsticks (1947,) sees the children spell connected much adventures aboard the flying bed.
2. Initially, Walt Disney acquired the rights to Bedknobs and Broomsticks, due to the fact that helium didn't deliberation Mary Poppins would ever happen.
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As anyone who has seen Saving Mr. Banks knows, Walt Disney worked precise hard for galore years to unafraid the movie rights to Mary Poppins from P.L. Travers. The rights to Bedknobs and Broomsticks were acquired arsenic a backup successful lawsuit Disney couldn't snag the rights to Mary Poppins, as some stories are astir magical caretakers who whisk their young wards disconnected to magical places.
3. Angela Lansbury's witch, Miss Eglantine Price, is loosely based connected a existent person.
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The World War II plotline was added for the movie, and Lansbury's quality is based connected Dion Fortune, a British occultist, who was portion of a radical who attempted to usage magical techniques to thwart the Nazi service from entering the UK. Obviously Dion Fortune did not animate suits of armor, but she did commune for angels to support the coastlines.
4. Walt Disney infamously fell asleep during a gathering storyboarding the movie.
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Perhaps that's the crushed that Bedknobs and Broomsticks was subsequently shelved erstwhile the rights to Mary Poppins were yet secured.
5. Bedknobs and Broomsticks, however, would yet go the past Disney movie that Walt, himself, greenlit.
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The movie was fixed the go-ahead successful April of 1966, conscionable a fewer months earlier Disney's decease connected December 15 of the aforesaid year. The movie would spell done respective much stages of improvement though, earlier it was yet released successful 1971.
6. Julie Andrews nearly played the pb role.
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The connections betwixt Mary Poppins and Bedknobs and Broomsticks are legion. Due to the occurrence of the erstwhile and the similarities of the plot, the relation of Eglantine Price was primitively offered to Julie Andrews, but Andrews turned it down, saying it was excessively akin to that of Mary Poppins. The relation was subsequently fixed to Lansbury, who signed her declaration connected Halloween of 1969. A fewer days later, Andrews called Disney to judge the role, feeling she owed it to Disney fixed the occurrence of Mary Poppins, lone to find that it had been filled.
7. David Tomlinson wasn't the archetypal choice for Professor Browne either.
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While David Tomlinson besides starred successful Mary Poppins, helium wasn't the archetypal prime for Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Dick Van Dyke, Peter Ustinov and Ron Moody were each offered the role, earlier the workplace circled backmost to Tomlinson, who was a Disney staple, having besides appeared successful The Love Bug.
8. Many members of the formed and unit were linked to World War II.
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While the publication doesn't person a World War II backdrop, the movie is acceptable during the bombing of London, and being filmed lone 20 years aft the war, starred galore actors who had lived done it. Director Robert Stevenson, on with Lansbury and histrion Roddy McDowall (Mr. Jelk) each moved to the US from the Uk owed to the war. Tomlinson fought during the warfare successful the Royal Air Force, and Robert Sherman, 1 of the songwriters, served successful the US Army and liberated the Dachau attraction camp.
9. The opening credits are based connected a celebrated tapestry that dates backmost to 1066 A.D.
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Artist David Jonas, who designed the main titles, based them connected the Bayeux Tapestry, a 11th-century portion of art that depicts the Norman Conquest.
10. Angela Lansbury did not bask filming a movie with truthful galore peculiar effects.
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Due to Bedknobs and Broomsticks combining animation with live-action filming, on with different peculiar effects, the full movie had to beryllium storyboarded framework by frame. If an histrion was not lasting successful the close place, the animators would not beryllium capable to integrate their enactment seamlessly. Because of each the method aspects, Lansbury said her acting was "very by the numbers" and didn't springiness her overmuch country to research creatively.
11. The sodium-screen vapor process was utilized to make the animated sequences.
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Before greenscreen technology, Walt Disney Studios pioneered (and won an Oscar for) the sodium-screen vapor process (also known arsenic yellowscreen). The filming process could isolate actors against a backdrop and past integrate them into different filmed oregon animated landscape. The astir notable usage of the process was successful Mary Poppins, but Disney utilized the method often successful the 1960s and 70s earlier exertion precocious past it.
12. Cardboard stand-ins were used for the animated characters.
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Because of the method quality of yellowscreen and combining the live-action and animated worlds, life-size cutouts of the animated characters were utilized for blocking purposes truthful that each live-action framework would acceptable perfectly with its animated counterpart.
13. That shot lucifer country took a twelvemonth to animate and outgo astir $1 million.
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Perhaps the astir awesome country successful Bedknobs and Broomsticks is the 22-minute-long shot lucifer for which Professor Browne presides arsenic referee. The scene, which includes some animated and live-action characters, includes 130 gags and plentifulness of fast-paced action.
14. The formation scenes were filmed connected a formation successful California, not Britain.
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While the movie whitethorn beryllium acceptable successful the English countryside, the full movie was filmed successful California. Most scenes were filmed connected the Disney batch successful Burbank, but the formation sequences with the German soldiers were changeable connected determination adjacent Los Angeles, and made to look little tropical utilizing movie magic.
15. "The Beautiful Briny" was initially written for Mary Poppins.
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Yet again the fates of Mary Poppins and Bedknobs and Broomsticks are intertwined. The opus "The Beautiful Briney" was primitively written by Robert and Richard Sherman for Mary Poppins. However, the opus was yet deleted from the movie and truthful was recycled during the underwater series successful Bedknobs and Broomsticks.
16. Some shots were filmed utilizing matte backdrops.
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Since Bedknobs and Broomsticks was filmed successful Southern California, each of the shots of the English countryside are really painted matte backdrops.
17. Three songs were chopped from the archetypal version
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The archetypal runtime of Bedknobs and Broomsticks was 141 minutes, but owed to a scheduling struggle for the Radio City Music Hall premiere, the movie was trimmed by 23 minutes. Many of the cuts came by mode of songs with "A Step successful the Right Direction," "With a Flair," and "Nobody's Problems" each being chopped from the archetypal theatrical release.
Depending connected however you ticker Bedknobs and Broomsticks, the runtimes are rather different. The 1979 re-release includes an adjacent shorter runtime, but the 1996 restoration and aboriginal DVD see overmuch of the archetypal deleted material. The mentation presently disposable connected Disney+ however, is the 117-minute archetypal theatrical version.
18. The movie has antithetic titles successful different languages.
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In France, the movie is called L'Apprentie sorcière (The Sorcerer Apprentice, arsenic a feminine name), portion the European Spanish mentation is dubbed La bruja novata (The Novice Witch), and the Latin American mentation is called "Travesuras de una bruja" (Mischiefs of a Witch).
19. You tin inactive spot the titular bedknob.
Walt Disney Pictures/Everett Collection
The magical bedknob is housed astatine the Walt Disney Archives successful Burbank, California, and tin beryllium recovered successful a show lawsuit successful the speechmaking country there.
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