Julie Andrews
Julie Andrews
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Julie Andrews

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Julie Andrews

Dame Julie Andrews (born Julia Elizabeth Wells; 1 October 1935) is an English actress, singer, and author. She has garnered numerous accolades throughout her career, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, three Emmy Awards, three Grammy Awards, and seven Golden Globe Awards as well as nominations for three Tony Awards. One of the biggest box office draws of the 1960s, Andrews has been honoured with the Kennedy Center Honors in 2001, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2007, and the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2022. She was made a Dame (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in the 2000 New Year Honours.

A child actress and singer, Andrews appeared in the West End in 1948 and from 1950 to 1952 on the radio programme "Educating Archie" in which she played Archie's girlfriend [1]. She made her Broadway debut in The Boy Friend (1954). Billed as "Britain's youngest prima donna", she rose to prominence in Broadway musicals starring as Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady (1956) and Queen Guinevere in Camelot (1960). She also starred in the Rodgers and Hammerstein television musical Cinderella (1957). She made her film debut playing the title role in Walt Disney's Mary Poppins (1964) and won the Academy Award for Best Actress. The following year, she starred in the musical film The Sound of Music (1965), playing Maria von Trapp and winning the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical.

Andrews starred in various films, working with directors including her husband Blake Edwards, George Roy Hill, and Alfred Hitchcock. Films she starred in include The Americanization of Emily (1964), Hawaii (1966), Torn Curtain (1966), Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967), Star! (1968), The Tamarind Seed (1974), 10 (1979), S.O.B. (1981), Victor/Victoria (1982), That's Life! (1986), and Duet for One (1986). She later returned to films, acting in The Princess Diaries (2001), The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement (2004), as well as Eloise at the Plaza and Eloise at Christmastime (both 2003). She also has voiced roles in the Shrek franchise (2001–2010) and the Despicable Me franchise (2010–present).

Andrews is also known for her collaborations with Carol Burnett, including television specials in 1962, 1971, and 1989. She starred in her variety special, The Julie Andrews Hour (1973), for which she received the Primetime Emmy Award. Recently she co-created and hosted Julie's Greenroom (2008, 2017), and voiced Lady Whistledown in the Netflix series Bridgerton (2020–present). Andrews has co-authored numerous children's books with her daughter and two autobiographies, Home: A Memoir of My Early Years (2008) and Home Work: A Memoir of My Hollywood Years (2019).

Julia Elizabeth Wells was born on 1 October 1935 in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England. Her mother, Barbara Ward Wells (née Morris; 25 July 1910–1984) was born in Chertsey and married Edward Charles "Ted" Wells (1908–1990), a teacher of metalwork and woodwork, in 1932. Andrews was conceived as a result of an affair her mother had with a family friend. Andrews learned of her true parentage from her mother in 1950, although it was not publicly disclosed until her 2008 autobiography.

With the outbreak of World War II, her parents went their separate ways and were soon divorced. Each remarried: Barbara to Ted Andrews, in 1943, and Ted Wells in 1944 to Winifred Maud (Hyde) Birkhead, a war widow and former hairstylist at a war work factory that employed them both in Hinchley Wood, Surrey. Wells assisted with evacuating children to Surrey during the Blitz, while Andrews's mother joined her husband in entertaining the troops through the Entertainments National Service Association. Andrews lived briefly with Wells and her brother, John, in Surrey.

In 1940, Wells sent her to live with her mother and stepfather, who Wells thought would be better able to provide for his talented daughter's artistic training. While Andrews had been used to calling her stepfather "Uncle Ted", her mother suggested it would be more appropriate to refer to her stepfather as "Pop", while her father remained "Dad" or "Daddy" to her, a change which she disliked. The Andrews family was "very poor" and "lived in a bad slum area of London" at the time, stating that the war "was a very black period in my life." According to Andrews, her stepfather was violent and an alcoholic. He twice tried to get into bed with his stepdaughter while drunk, resulting in Andrews fitting a lock on her door.

As the stage career of her mother and stepfather improved, they were able to afford better surroundings, first to Beckenham and then, as the war ended, back to the Andrews' hometown of Hersham. The family took up residence at the Old Meuse, in West Grove, Hersham, a house (since demolished) where Andrews's maternal grandmother had served as a maid. Andrews's stepfather sponsored lessons for her, first at the independent arts educational school Cone-Ripman School (previously ArtsEd, now Tring Park School for the Performing Arts) and thereafter with concert soprano and voice instructor Madame Lilian Stiles-Allen.

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