Interview: Richard Sherman on The Boys

Songwriter Wrote for Disney's Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book,

Aug 21, 2009 Dominic von Riedemann

In this exclusive interview, Richard Sherman - profiled in the Disney film The Boys: The Sherman Brothers Story - discusses meeting, and writing songs, for Walt Disney.

Disney's latest documentary, The Boys: The Sherman Brothers Story (opening August 21st), isn't just about Robert and Richard Sherman, songwriters for classic films like Winnie the Pooh, Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Bedknobs and Broomsticks. It's also an intimate look at two brothers who, despite creating some of the most memorable songs of the past century, couldn't stand to be in the same room with each other.

Jeffrey and Gregory Sherman – the doc's writers/directors, and sons of Robert and Richard respectively – simultaneously pay homage to these songwriting legends while blowing the lid off a family feud that resulted in the two cousins never meeting until 2002: when they attended a West End premiere for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

In Part #1 of this exclusive interview, Richard Sherman tells how he and his brother entered Walt Disney's orbit, and the process that led them to write songs for Mary Poppins.

S101: How did you hook up with Walt Disney?

Richard Sherman: “That was a lucky accident. My brother Bob and I were writing rock n’ roll songs, pop songs, and we’d come up with this idea about the tallest guy in school, and we called it “Tall Paul.” Everyone was writing songs about girls that guys were singing: “Long, Tall Sally,” “Short, Fat Fanny,” that sort of thing. So we said, 'Let’s write a girl’s song about a guy: 'Tall Paul/He’s my all,' that was it.

“So we wrote it, and we recorded it ourselves with a little girl named Judy Harriet who sang it very well: it was recorded and sent out and . . . nothing happened. But somebody who worked for Disney in New York was looking for material for Annette Funicello, who was the biggest star of the original Mouseketeers. He thought “Tall Paul” would be perfect for her.

“So, long story short, they recorded it and it became a tremendous hit. And the people at Disneyland Records asked, 'Do you have any more songs that would be suitable for Annette?' and we said, 'Oh yes, we got lots of them!' and we got nothing! (laughs) We started writing like crazy and we were told that there were a couple of openings for her next (recording) session.

“We brought in 4 songs that we’d written over a period of 3 days, and we were really working under a flurry because nobody had asked us for songs before. We were hoping to get one of them into the session, but they dumped all the songs they had and put all 4 of our songs in the next session, which was the entire session. And Annette had a couple of big hits out of that.

“Then we started creating a Hawaiian album called HawaiiAnnette, then a record with all Italian songs, called ItaliAnnette, and we’d write 3 or 4 new songs that were in that style. She would always ask, 'What are you going to write next? BasAnnette?' (laughs) She was very funny; we loved her.

“All the while – we didn’t know this at the time – but Walt Disney was listening to everything we were doing because he loved Annette and he had discovered her, so he asked the guys at Disneyland Records, 'Why don’t you get those Sherman brothers to write a song for Annette for this next movie we’re sending her to England to do?' So they asked us and we said, 'Oh God yes!' (laughs)

“And when we played that song for the record executives, they said, 'Now Walt’s gotta hear it.' And that began our love affair with Walt Disney and his productions, and so forth. Everything we wrote he loved: he gave us assignment after assignment, and that eventually ended up with him handing us the Mary Poppins book and saying, 'Tell me what you think.'

“We knew that was the gauntlet thrown. We came up with a lot of the ideas for the story and so forth, and the rest of it was history. You’ve seen the movie, I guess!” (laughs)

What was the first tune to come out for Mary Poppins?

“We wanted to pinpoint the period and style, because Mary Poppins was written in the 1930’s and we thought, 'That’s not a good time to have a nanny flying out of the air and into Depression London.' At that point, England was playing watered-down American-style music. But, at the turn of the century, there was English-style music hall. So we wanted that sound.

“So the first thing we wrote was (sings and plays “It’s a Jolly Holiday” on the piano); very period (keeps playing the song). We did 4 numbers like that: “Uncle Albert” (plays the first chorus), we had little bits and pieces of things, then we had “Feed the Birds” (plays and sings a chorus), that was sort of an English folk song which told what the story was about. Walt dug that song very, very much; it became his favourite song.

“So we had 4 or 5 fragments of songs and a storyline, because there was no storyline in the books. We created a storyline from 6 of the chapters. Let me not denigrate the fact that the books were very inspiring and thrilling, but there was no real story and we wanted a story. So we built up this trouble in the family, and Mary Poppins straightens it out. And (original Mary Poppins author P.L.) Travers hated it because she didn’t write it.”

(In Part #2, legendary songwriter Richard Sherman talks about battling Mrs. Travers, and how Julie Andrews' misgivings resulted in a classic song. Also look for an exclusive interview with Jeffrey and Gregory Sherman, also coming to this space.)

The copyright of the article Interview: Richard Sherman on The Boys in Animated Films is owned by Dominic von Riedemann. Permission to republish Interview: Richard Sherman on The Boys in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

legendary songwriter Richard Sherman

What do you think about this article?

---

NOTE: Because you are not a Suite101 member, your comment will be moderated before it is viewable.

post your comment

What is 9+9?