Thursday, April 12, 2012

The Sour Truth About P.L. Travers, the Woman Who Created Mary Poppins

A spoonful of sugar would definitely not have made her--a pushy, abusive mother--any sweeter:
So she would be spinning in her grave to learn that her sour and self-absorbed life and extraordinary feud with Walt Disney are to be dramatised in a new film starring Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson to mark the 50th anniversary of the Disney classic. 
For while her flying heroine epitomised the magic of childhood, Travers was neither warm nor kindly. She was an intellectual snob who wrote erotic prose, was a one-time fascist sympathiser, occasional lesbian and appalling mother.
I think I saw that musical. It was called Gypsy.

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