This was the first live-action musical that Disney Studios produced. It was as heavily promoted as the studio's other big films, but was a failure at the box office. It was one of the few Disney films never given a second run in the neighborhood theaters, or even re-released, as so many other Disney films were (it first appeared on television - in two one-hour segments telecast a week apart - only eight years after its original release. Eight years was usually the amount of time the Disney studios used to wait to re-release their films theatrically). Disney did not make another musical on this elaborate a scale until Mary Poppins (1964), which became its most successful film during Walt Disney's lifetime.
Many of the sets from this movie - including Mary's garden and fountain, the shoe house, the pumpkin house and the trees from the forest - were on display at Disneyland in Anaheim from November of 1961 through 1962 as a walk-through attraction.
Ward Kimball was originally to have directed the film, until a falling out with Walt Disney. While Disney was away, Kimball arranged for Ray Bolger to audition, and approved set designs, which were considered Walt's domain. Then, a studio publicist took out a trade advert -- unbeknownst to Kimball -- announcing him as the film's director. All of this led Disney to decide that Kimball had gotten above himself, and he fired him.
The stop-motion wooden soldier segment took more than 6 months to film.
The toy soldiers also made an appearance in Walt Disney's Mary Poppins (1964) in the nursery sequence and are favorite features of holiday parades in Disney Parks to this day. Disney animator Bill Justice made sure the Park soldiers were identical to the movie counterparts.
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