An Interview with the Sherman Brothers
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Robert and some of his family
Robert Sherman
Doobie Moseley: Can you tell me how you and your brother came to work for Disney?
Robert Sherman: Yes, sure. We were writing rock and roll songs and Annette Funicello recorded some of my songs. One of them was Tall Paul which became a big hit and we started writing more songs for her and she was going to do a picture in England and Walt Disney said, who are those boys that are writing all those little songs for Annette and Jimmy Johnson. The head of the music company, said Sherman Brothers. He said, send them around and that’s how we came to meet Walt Disney.
Q: I read in your book that at your first meeting with Walt he was actually a little confused about what he had brought you in for.
A: Yes, we got there and he said, "these two girls, twin sisters and they meet in summer camp for the first time" and he started talking about what eventually became The Parent Trap and I said, Mr. Disney, I didn’t call him Walt then. Mr. Disney we’re here with a song for Annette. We’re the voice masters and he said oh! Let’s see what you got. So we played the Strumming Song and when it was over he said, yeah, that’ll work. We didn’t know that was one of the nicest things Walt ever said to anything.
Q: Obviously you worked with Walt Disney for many, many years. What really stands out in your mind about what it’s like to work with him?
A: The inspiration. The warmth. The imagination he exuded. He was a terrific human being and also a terrific man, a really imaginative person. That’s what stands out in my mind.
Q: What was the hardest part of working with him?
A: When he died.
Q: Really.
A: Yeah, it’s like when the engine stops. He was always on our shoulders.
Q: That really comes across on the cover of your book. Were there any projects where the two of you and Walt Disney really butted heads on exactly the direction to go or anything like that?
A: Never.
Q: Really.
A: Never.
Q: How involved did you and your brother get in actually creating the stories of the films he worked on instead of just the songs?
A: We were very involved, extremely involved. Sometimes we went off in the wrong direction (laughs), but we were involved.
Q: Are there any scenes or characters that stand out that you two were really instrumental in creating?
A: I think one day after Julie was cast in Mary Poppins, Walt said to come to lunch today, we have a girl coming who we want for the mother for the Banks children and when we got there, there was Glynis Johns. She was under the impression that she was called to become Mary Poppins and Walt said, "no dear, we have Julie Andrews for Mary Poppins. We want you for the mother." She was kind of taken a back. She said, "oh, I don’t know." So he said "the boys are working on a song, it’s almost finished. It’s a great song for the mother, aren’t you boys?" We said, "yes." They’ll have it next Monday. So she said, "okay, we’ll see" and we worked all weekend. We wrote a song called Sister Suffragette. When she heard it she loved it. She said, I’ll do the picture. That was it.
Q: I remember reading in your book the first time you had a meeting with Mrs. Pamela Travers and she was not exactly pleased with what you had worked on.
A: She was weird. The section she writes is the Cracked Dalton Ball and the snake, ugly things that she can think of. She didn’t like anything we wrote.
Q: Since she had approval of the screenplay how many changes did you have to make after showing that to her?
A: None. We said, we’re going to do it this way. She said, oh. She left. Then Walt came back. He was away for two weeks, he talked to her. When he came back, he said, we have another book in case we can’t use this called Bedknobs and Broomsticks. We said, well OK. We were very depressed. After 30 days that she had, she said okay, Walt can do it, which caused us to celebrate.
Q: You’ve also done a lot of songs for theme parks like the Tiki Room, I think that was probably the first one and then just recently the new Tomorrowland songs at Disneyland.
A: Yeah, we did a lot of that stuff.
Q: What are the special challenges involved with doing a theme park song as opposed to a film song?
A: Nothing.
Q: Really.
A: Just write a song.
Q: What are your favorite theme park songs that you’ve created, do you have any?
A: Small World.
Q: I know shortly after Epcot opened you created what happen to be three of my favorite songs for the Imagination Pavilion, One Little Spark, Magic Journeys and I think probably my favorite song of yours of all is Makin' Memories.
A: That was fun. I like that too. I like that. It isn’t there any more.
Q: Yes, I know, none of them are there unfortunately.
A: No, I don’t know why. It needs a new suit.