How Julie Andrews sorts out her “demons”
Julie Andrews reflected on her career and how therapy helped her become “a better mum and a better wife” in a new interview.
Speaking to Anthony Mason on CBS This Morning, the British actress said therapy “sorted out my demons and what I call the garbage that clutters your head and you don’t need”.
“It helped me very much understand and put in perspective my childhood, of course. That was probably the biggest work I did,” the 84-year-old said. “And it makes for a lot of compassion and understanding, and you realise that everybody else is in the same boat.”
Andrews, who made her Broadway debut in The Boy Friend ahead of her 19th birthday, revealed in her new memoir that she felt “scared” and “inadequate” during her early years in the movie industry. “Was I scared? You bet. Did I feel inadequate? All the time,” she wrote.
She told Mason that she was “sad” and disappointed that she was passed over for a part in the film version of My Fair Lady in favour of Audrey Hepburn.
“I did understand the choice,” Andrews said. “The Warner Brothers Studios … they wanted big stars and big box office names.”
However, Andrews later beat out Hepburn to win the Golden Globe for her titular role in the 1964 flick Mary Poppins.
She also shared that she was initially hesitant to take up the offer to star in The Sound of Music. “I was very worried when I was asked to do The Sound of Music,” Andrews said. “That it could be very saccharine, with the mountains, with the music, with seven children.”