Not How It Seems: ‘Mary Poppins’

In 1964, Walt Disney’s adaptation of Mary Poppins finally came to fruition. Focusing only on the film adaptation of this story, there’s a fairly positive progressive side to Mary Poppins as well as an underbelly of a possibly anti-feminist subplot.

As progressive goes, we have the entire surface area of the film. Like the P.L. Travers character says in Saving Mr. Banks, Mary Poppins wasn’t there to save the children, but to save Mr. Banks (from himself, basically). Mary Poppins comes to town and becomes the nanny of the mischievous Banks children. Through her connection, they interact with Burt, a man who’s basically a bum, but constantly cheerful and changes his career every day. He does what he wants to do even if there isn’t much money in it, and he loves every minute of it. Burt is portrayed in probably the most positive light of anyone in the whole film. Not only does he show the audience the very bohemian lifestyle that Walt Disney would so soon rally against, but he makes it look like an absolute blast.

And that’s just the drawing on the surface (if you will). More important is what happens throughout the course of the film, as Mr. Banks is transformed from being a die-hard banking fanatic to a guy who really feels okay with losing his job because he can still laugh about things, to a guy who gets his job back but he can still take his kids to the park to fly a kite. The main moral of the film seems to be that you should do what makes you happy; spend time with your family, enjoy the life you’re living instead of constantly planning for a future you might not live to see. That’s what the bank director does his entire life. He plans for a financial future and obsesses over tuppence. In the end, he’s laughed so little that chuckling over a stupid joke makes him literally laugh himself to death. That’s pretty dark, even if the dude kind of had it coming to him for trying to steal Michael Banks’ tuppence.

That stuff though, is what the film is known for. That’s why it’s a great movie to show kids so they don’t grow up to be like my sister (who never saw the movie and who I’m pretty sure thinks sitting on a mound of money is the way to a happy life).

But, without sounding like a skipping record (which, incidentally, my own copy of the Mary Poppins soundtrack is), the subplot of this movie is fairly anti-feminist on the surface. And while it doesn’t make women look as defeated as My Fair Lady, it’s not bounds ahead.

Let’s start with Mrs. Winifred Banks, a suffragette who’s slightly oblivious and singular in her purpose to obtain votes for women. The only thing more important than suffrage is maintaining a calm and traditional home life with her husband who doesn’t approve of all the suffrage nonsense (“You know how the cause infuriates Mr. Banks”).

She doesn’t take care of her children, even when it’s Mary Poppins’ day off and there’s no one else to do the job. She left them in the care of Burt  rather than taking care of them herself. A random bum chimney sweep was evidently suitable as a childcare provider. This is her equivalent to Mr. Banks’ work at the bank, to his neglect of the children. That’s the only reason this storyline is acceptable, because the point it’s trying to make isn’t that demanding votes is worthless, but rather that caring for anything more than your own flesh and blood is kind of silly. Still, I can’t help but cringe when this already subservient woman attaches her “votes for women” sash as the tail of their thinly-veiled-metaphor-for-family-involvement kite.

And even the suffrage song, which is the only thing that makes Mrs. Banks’ involvement more than a plot device, was only added to calm Glynis Johns down when she learned that she hadn’t actually bagged the role of Mary Poppins as she’d believed.

But there’s yet another storyline that aggravates me just a little bit, and that’s the question of “did Mary Poppins even change Mr. Banks? Or was it Burt?” Mary Poppins tries to help Mr. Banks connect with his kids (much like Maria does in The Sound of Music, but much more passive-aggressively), but she fails, only succeeding in causing a run on the bank. Mr. Banks sees her as a trickster, a woman who manipulated his mind. A couple hundred years earlier, he would have had her burnt at the stake for a witch (probably) and a couple decades later he would have had an affair with her and blamed her as the evil temptress (probably not). Only when he has a conversation with Burt somewhat reminiscent of “Cat’s in the Cradle,” does he realize some things about his own life  that Mary Poppins has been trying to get across all along. So he trusts a common chimney sweep before an educated female nanny.

There are, however, ways to refute both of these arguments. This author suggests that the sash, being one of many, was more of a symbol that Mrs. Banks was ready to be open about her cause with Mr. Banks than a symbol that she was giving it up for good. The message of votes for women could be seen in the sky, almost as though Winifred Banks was advertising her cause whilst spending time with her family. Maybe Jane will join her on their next march.

And even though Burt has to suggest the change to Mr. Banks, Mr. Banks is insistent upon it being Mary Poppins that was right when he learns to laugh.

So although even P.L. Travers herself found the end message of the film to be anti-feminist, perhaps it’s really not as bad as it seems.

“Not How It Seems” (usually) attempts to support the argument that favorite movie musicals aren’t really the dated anti-feminist films some people perceive them to be.

Emma Sedam

Emma Sedam is a music enthusiast from Marion, Ohio with a knack for fashion, pop-culture, and storytelling. She runs a weekly local radio show and an all-eras music blog. You can find her on most social media outlets.