Actor Lin-Manuel Miranda has described his upcoming film Mary Poppins Returns as "designed to make people feel deliriously happy".
The fantasy-musical sequel has received some wonderful first reviews too, which can only add to all that happiness.
Telling The Guardian about his time shooting the movie during the Brexit referendum and US election, the Hamilton creator explained: "We were there for a very strange time. But the silver lining to all that is we were making this movie that is just unalloyed joy.
"So you'd read a headline and see hardship, then you'd go to work and say: 'Well, we're making [Mary Poppins]. That is literally just designed to make people feel deliriously happy.'"
Further recalling his Poppins experience – and how it offered a unique opportunity to get away from the spotlight – Miranda marvelled: "Poppins was both incredibly hard work and sort of this joyous vacation. Because I had just been in Hamilton-mania in the States, it was starting to get to the point where I couldn't ride the train without having a conversation about Hamilton.
"So the only sane response is to chop off all your hair and leave the country. I was really very anonymous here [in the UK] and that was a wonderful thing to reclaim, to ride the tube around and take my kid to Lady Di park.
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"To sort of do normal things was wonderful, because it was getting weird. Like, famous-person weird."
Mary Poppins Returns floats into cinemas on December 19 in the US and on December 21 in the UK.
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Reporter, Digital Spy
Dan is a freelance entertainment journalist. Beginning his writing career in 2014, Dan's work first graced the pages of cult publications Starburst magazine and Little White Lies before moving onto Total Film, Digital Spy, NME and Yahoo Entertainment.
In the film and TV universe, he kneels at the altar of Jim Carrey, Daniel Plainview, Mike Ehrmantraut and Paulie Walnuts.
