Born Julia Elizabeth Wells in England in 1935, she was discovered as a child to have a freakish but undeniably lovely four-octave singing voice. Her mother and stepfather, both Vaudeville performers, immediately got her into a singing career and she performed in music halls throughout her childhood and teens, always being immensely popular. At age 20, she performed in a London Palladium production of "Cinderella," launching her stage career.

She came to Broadway in 1954 with "The Boy Friend." It was a hit, and Julie Andrews became a bona fide star two years later in 1956, in the role of Eliza Doolittle in the unprecedented hit "My Fair Lady." Her star status continued in 1957, when she starred in the hit TV-production of Cinderella and through 1960, when she played Guenevere in "Camelot". She also starred in many TV-specials, notably one with Carol Burnett.

In 1963, Walt Disney asked if she would like to star in his upcoming production, a lavish musical fantasy that combined live-action and animation. Julie said she would do it if she did not get to play Eliza in the pending film production of My Fair Lady. She didn't, and so she made an auspicious film debut in Walt Disney's Mary Poppins, a huge hit which got her the Academy Award for Best Actress. (Audrey Hepburn, who played Eliza in the My Fair Lady film, wasn't even nominated.)

Now, Julie was a real star, and it was her star power that helped make her third film, The Sound of Music, the highest-grossing movie of its day and one of the highest-grossing of all time. The only problem was that now audiences identified her only with singing, sugary-sweet nannies and governesses. Therefore, they could not accept her in dramatic roles (The Americanization of Emily and definitely not in an 'Alfred Hitchcock (I) thriller Torn Curtain). However, the musicals Julie subsequently made were casualties of the boom in musical film she helped to create. Thoroughly Modern Millie, Star!, and Darling Lili all bombed at the box office.

Fortunately, Julie did not let this keep her down. She did work in nightclubs and hosted a TV variety series in the 1970s. Then she made a comeback to movies with an appearance in 10, directed by husband Blake Edwards. He helped continue to keep her on the rise by directing her in subsequent roles that were entirely different from anything she had been seen in before. There was the movie star who bared her breasts on-screen in S.O.B., the woman playing a man playing a woman in Victor Victoria and the sheer novelty of seeing Julie Andrews in these roles, not to mention her brilliant performances in both of them, undoubtedly helped make them successes.

She continued acting throughout the 1980s and 1990s in movies and TV, hosting several specials and starring in a short-lived sitcom. In 1995, she returned to Broadway to star in the musical version of Victor Victoria and was again a smash. Sadly, an operation on her vocal chords left her singing voice badly damaged in 1998, but she has not let even this stop her, giving a show-stopping appearance at the 1999 Tony Awards and appearing in the TV-movie One Special Night. Julie Andrews, in all her many incarnations, will no doubt keep us very entertained for years to come.



Darling Lili (1970): $1,110,000
Star! (1968): $1,000,000
Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967): $1,000,000
Hawaii (1966): $700,000
Torn Curtain (1966): $750,000
The Sound of Music (1965): $225,000
Mary Poppins (1964): $125,000

Was named a Dame by Britain's Queen Elizabeth II on the Millenium New Year's Honours List on December 31, 1999. Underwent throat surgery. [June 1997] Uses the pen-name 'Julie Edwards'. Spent some time in a psychiatric clinic, to help her cope with the trauma resulting from her throat surgery. 7 September 2000 - Her malpractice suit against the 2 New York Mt. Sinai Hospital doctors who allegedly botched her throat surgery was settled for an undisclosed sum. While she played the original Eliza Dolittle in the Broadway musical "My Fair Lady", Audrey Hepburn played the part in the movie My Fair Lady (1964). The studio executives did not want Andrews because she hadn't had any experience in film and thought Hepburn would be the better choice. However, while the film My Fair Lady took home several Oscars in 1964, it failed to win the Best Actress category. That award went to none other than Julie Andrews for her performance in Mary Poppins (1964). She has a rose named after her. Author of children's books: "Mandy"; "The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles"; "Little Bo: The Story of Bonnie Boadicea"; "Little Bo in France: The Further Adventures of Bonnie Boadicea"; "Dumpy the Dump Truck"; "Dumpy and his Friends"; "Dumpy and the Great Storm"; "Dumpy Saves Christmas"; "Dumpy's Friends on the Farm" and "Dumpy at School". Her writing style on "Mandy" and "The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles" is reminiscent of Frances Hodgson Burnett and Roald Dahl. In 2002, she was voted the 59th greatest Briton ever in a BBC poll. Has owned a chalet in Gstaad, Switzerland, for many years. Every year she pays for Gstaad's Christmas lights. In July she presents the prize for the winner of the annual Gstaad Tennis Open. She once said if she was nervous before a performance on stage, she'd just have to look at a photo from 'lovely' Gstaad, and she was reassured. In the 1960s she sported a bumper sticker on her car reading "Mary Poppins is a junkie". Mary Poppins (1964) for Disney, The Sound of Music (1965) for 20th Century Fox and Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967) for Universal were the biggest money-makers yet for their studios. However, her next two films, Star! (1968) and Darling Lili (1970), to put it mildly, failed to get their money back. Changed her last name from Wells to Andrews when her mother married her stepfather Ted Andrews. She adopted two children from Vietnam with Blake Edwards, Amy Edwards (b. 1974) and Joanna Edwards (b. 1975). Was passed over for the role on Eliza Dolittle in favor of Audrey Hepburn for the film My Fair Lady (1964). Unlike Andrews, however, Hepburn was not a natural singer. She took voice lessons and recorded the tracks for the movie, but the producers, without telling Audrey, dubbed her voice with that of Marni Nixon. Nixon appeared with Andrews in The Sound of Music (1965). Filmed a cameo sequence as a chambermaid in Blake Edwards' 1975 Inspector Clouseau comedy The Return of the Pink Panther (1975), but the sequence ended up on the cutting-room floor. Sings scales rather than songs in the shower. Her performance as Mary Poppins in Mary Poppins (1964) is ranked #45 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time. Possessed a five-octave coloratura soprano range until a vocal nodule surgery mishap ruined her singing voice. The Americanization of Emily (1964) is the only black and white movie she ever made. Grandmother of daughter Emma Waltons children Samuel and Hope. Received the Screen Actors Guild lifetime achievement award on January 28, 2007. Mother-in-law of Steve Hamilton. Could sing notes only dogs could hear at the age of seven. She has two great-grandchildren, Shaely and Kaden, from step-granddaughter Kayti. Her brother, Christopher Stuart, was born in May, 1946. Was one of the first women to be named a Disney Legend (and inducted into the Disney Hall of Fame). She was in the 1991 class with animator Mary Blair. Julie Andrews was nominated for the 1956 Tony Award for Actress in a Musical for "My Fair Lady". According to her autobiography, she first saw second husband Blake Edwards at a party while she and first husband Tony Walton were on their honeymoon. She and Blake did not become friends until several years later.