'I was very lucky,” she says, a phrase that occurs often in 'Home Work.” 'I was blessed with a voice that gave me many wonderful opportunities.” While nothing like an overnight success - suggest that she took Hollywood by storm and you will be reminded, gently but firmly, that Andrews began working the British vaudeville circuit at 10 and made her Broadway debut at 19 - the fact remains that she began her film career by winning an Oscar for her first movie ('Mary Poppins”), a feat she followed up a year later with the critically acclaimed antiwar drama 'The Americanization of Emily” and a little picture called 'The Sound of Music.” Just like the title.Īfter all, when choosing a title for the story of her transition from 'star of stage” to 'star of stage, screen, television and the hearts of millions,” Andrews could have gone big. The tone she and Hamilton settled on is conversational and strikingly matter-of-fact. I wanted to write about how things came at me, about paying my dues, about learning my craft, learning who I was, learning to parent, all the homework that I did.” 'In ‘Home' I was an adult telling a child's story,” Andrews says, speaking from Sag Harbor, N.Y., where she lives, 'but in ‘Home Work' I am telling the story of my adult life. Although Andrews had already written one memoir, 'Home,” she wanted 'Home Work” to feel different because the two portions of her life were different. But memoirs, like memories, are tricky things, the past reconstructed in the present, and finding a tone that reflects the reality of the former and the perspective of the latter is not easy.

Home by Julie Andrews Edwards