Disney Announces Mary Poppins Reboot

Disney admitted this week that it's working on a follow-up to the 1964 hit musical Mary Poppins for release sometime in the near future. More a sequel than a straight-forward reboot, the new film will pull its story from the series of books written by P.L. Travers and will take place about 20 years after the original's settting. The 1964 film was drawn mostly from the first volume in Travers' eight-volume series.

Although fans of the original film - and haters of reboots in general - were predictably skeptical that a new version of Mary Poppins could live up to the standards set by Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke in the original, Disney has called on some pretty reliable talent to put the project together. Director Rob Marshall and producers John DeLuca and Marc Platt will head up the new film; the trio were responsible for the successful 2014 version of Into the Woods. Songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who have previously worked on Hairspray, will write the new songs, and David Magee will write the screenplay.

While no casting decisions have been announced yet, the rumor mill suggests that the studio is courting Emily Blunt to take on the role of the English nanny who was played by Andrews in the original.