womenwhokickass:

Julie Andrews Why she kicks ass

• She is an English singer, film and theatre actress, and author.
• She began singing and acting professionally in radio in England when she was 12. Theatre followed soon after that.
• She moved to the United States when she was 19 and originated the roles of Eliza Dolittle & Queen Gwenivere in My Fair Lady and Camelot. She starred in Broadway shows for five years in a row. Rogers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella was originally a 1950 television movie musical that they wrote for her.
• Walt Disney personally asked her to star in Mary Poppins after seeing Camelot. She won an Oscar for that role. She was very close with the Disney family and has done several Disney films since then.
• She and Carol Burnett did two musical comedy TV specials live from Carnegie Hall.
• At the age of 60, she went back to Broadway and starred as Victor Grazinski and Victoria Grant. The play ran for two years, and she was nominated for a Tony, Broadway’s highest honor.
• She turned down that nomination because she felt her cast should have been nominated as well.
• She has sang for the Queen several times.
• After a botched vocal surgery, she focused more on her writing career. She and  her daughter have been on the New York Times best sellers list consistently.
• In 2012, she won her only Grammy for Best Spoken Word Album for a children’s book they’d written.
• She has the distinction of being England’s first Dame and holds the title of Dame Commander.
• She is still making movies and writing books at 77.
• She and her husband help start an organization called Op USA, which help people around the world affected by natural disasters. She an out-spoken advocate for keeping fine arts in schools.