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What's distinctive about the film is the way it blends beautifully whimsical flourishes with a twist of melancholy. There's no good reason why a candy-colored Edwardian fantasy should include "Chim Chim Cher-ee," which has the Gallic bittersweetness of a chanson, but the combination gives the film charm, and plenty of it. On Broadway, while the stage magic is really astonishing (if clumsily deployed, blowing most of its best tricks in the first ten minutes), there's no charm to speak of. Next to the Sherman brothers' songs from the film, the new tunes are mere second-rate Broadway, with lyrics too vapid to quote. Matthew Bourne's dances are proficient but curiously joyless, the exception being a tap number for Bert that has a flourish too good to give away. Then there's the flying nanny herself. Unable to make Mary really lovable beneath her starch葉he secret of Julie Andrews's performance葉he talented newcomer Ashley Brown exposes Mary as what her detractors have always said: a pushy and undependable saccharine junkie. — Jeremy McCarter

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New York Magazine Reviews

• Jeremy McCarter's Full Review (11/27/06)

Featured In

• Mary Poppins: Long Story Short (11/20/06)