Mary Poppins floats into Melbourne

The stage show of Mary Poppins set to open at Her Majesty's Theatre in Melbourne on Thursday.

AAP Images

Related links

• Mary Poppins' Queensland homecoming
• Mary Poppins is practically perfect

FLOATING on air after wowing the West End and Broadway, Mary Poppins descends by umbrella in the land of her creator's birth this week.

After award-winning runs in London and New York, the musical stage adaptation of P.L. Travers' classic novels about the magical nanny opens in Melbourne on Thursday.

Travers grew up in Maryborough, and legend has it the idea for Poppins came from a woman she had seen roaming the Queensland town's streets dressed in a flowing dress and toting a parrot-handled umbrella.

More than 70 years later, a young woman from Adelaide takes on the role of the world's best-known nanny.

Verity Hunt-Ballard and the rest of the cast made their final preparations on Wednesday for the spectacular $16 million stage show at Her Majesty's Theatre.

With a vibrant rendition of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, a tap-dancing version of Step in Time complete with the full company and a romantically lit Chim Chim Cher-ee, Hunt-Ballard is dazzling as Poppins.

The 28-year-old also knows she's playing one of the world's best-loved musical and literary characters.

"It's very exciting, slightly scary and wonderful. I just hope I can do her justice," she told reporters on Wednesday.

So You Think You Can Dance judge Matt Lee shows he can tread the boards himself in his role as Bert the chimney sweep, while theatre stalwarts Marina Prior, Philip Quast and Debra Byrne also star.

Among the audience at Thursday's premiere will be American songwriter Richard Sherman, 82, who wrote the songs for the 1964 Hollywood movie in which Julie Andrews brought Mary Poppins to life.