Julie Andrews Recalls ‘Depression’ After She Lost Her Singing Voice Following Surgery in 1997

We know her from such classics like Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, but Julie Andrews is revealing that she found herself in a dark place when she lost her singing voice more than 20 years ago.

The 84-year-old recently sat down with AARP The Magazine for their October/November 2019 issue and touched on many different things, including the serious procedure she underwent in 1997. “When I woke up from an operation to remove a cyst on my vocal cord, my singing voice was gone. I went into a depression,” the actress told the outlet. “It felt like I’d lost my identity. But by good fortune that’s when my daughter Emma and I had been asked to write books for kids. So along came a brand-new career in my mid-60s. Boy, was that a lovely surprise. But do I miss singing: Yes. I really do.”

Julie may not have the singing voice she once had, but she of course can still hold a tune. “I would have been quite a sad lady if I hadn’t had the voice to hold on to,” the Hollywood star said. “The singing was the most important thing of all, and I don’t mean to be Pollyanna about how incredibly lost I’d have been without that.

Even though the Oscar winner made a career of starring in films, there is one regret she has in her life. “Everyone thinks I come from Windsor Castle or something. But I was so busy working as a kid. The only thing I had time for was to read on trains and planes,” Julie explained. “When I didn’t go to college because I was working, I said to my mum, ‘Are you sure I’m not going to miss college?’ She said, ‘Oh, you’ll have a much better education from life.’ But I always wished I’d had a real education.”

The Home Work author also recently found herself having to talk about one of her most classic roles when Mary Poppins Returns made its way to theaters — this time with fellow actress Emily Blunt as the magical nanny. However, Julie did not want to be a part of the sequel.

“She was very hands-off with the whole thing,” Emily, 36, explained to Variety. “There was discussion that maybe she would come and do a bit in the movie, and she was so generous, actually. She said to [director Rob Marshall], ‘Do you know what this is? This is Emily’s version of her and I don’t want it to be that she’s playing Mary Poppins the whole way through, but then I come in and there’s, like ‘Oh, but there’s the real Mary Poppins.'” What a lady!