Attention all you dancing queens!
The love for the Mamma Mia films goes deep. How could it not when you have all the necessary ingredients to make something truly magical: a star-studded cast, songs that make you want to get up and dance, and a heartfelt story.
Here we go again with these 10+ behind the scenes secrets that you didn’t know!
1. Amanda Seyfried almost wasn’t Sophie:
She wasn’t the only actress in the running for the coveted role.
Several other actresses, such as Mandy Moore, Amanda Bynes, Rachel McAdams, and Emmy Rossum, were also frontrunners.
2. Meryl Streep actually did the splits in the first film:
And get this: she did it on instinct! Is there anything this marvelous woman can’t do??
“I just did the splits on instinct. That’s what always happens with my acting. As an actor, you’re not allowed to think,” Streep told The Guardian in 2008.
3. Lily James didn’t talk for a week to prepare for the sequel:
Art takes dedication. Her silence also had a lot to do with the press tour she had wrapped up for Baby Driver .
“All I’d done is talk for so long and my voice was shot to hell it was just croaky and disgusting,” she told Build Series .
“So, it was me being really neurotic, as usual, but it was also me being told by the doctor I had to shut up … I just didn’t talk for a week.”
While that must have been done, it paid off, since she was the perfect actress and singer to play young Donna!
4. Cher was supposed to be in the first film:
Sadly, this never happened since she turned the role of Tayna down.
“I think she felt that the Tanya character was probably too close to her,” the creator and producer of Mamma Mia , Judy Craymar, told Vanity Fair .
In the end, the role went to Christine Baranski.
But when it came to playing Sophie’s grandmother, that role she couldn’t turn down.
Only because she didn’t have a choice!
The actress and singer told Sky News in 2018 that when the head of Universal Pictures called her about the part, he hung up before she could say no.
5. The “Super Trouper” number was completely authentic:
If you thought that scene in Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again looked really , really fun, that’s because it was.
“When they’re dancing in ‘Super Trouper,’ that’s all real,” the film’s director, Ol Parker told Awards Daily .
“We played the song loudly and sent them off to different corners … They just had an absolute hoot,” Parker said.
While filming this, Parker and his crew would go around and “cherry-pick bits of it.”
6. James memorized the first film to prepare for the sequel:
Playing a young Meryl Streep is no easy feat. This is a fact that James knows all too well.
She told Allure in 2018 that she prepared to step into the legendary actress’s shoes by rewatching the first film, over and over.
“Every moment of that film I know by heart,” she said.
“I think I could mimic [Meryl Streep] pretty well, but then in the moment, when you’re there on set with the cameras rolling and you’ve got another actor in front of you … the thing I like about acting is fully surrendering to that moment and not trying to control what happens. So I think I just forgot to do anything.”
7. Seyfried found out about the sequel only *two* days after she had just given birth:
Here we go again, indeed!
“I couldn’t wrap my head around it,” Amanda said during an interview with This Morning . “I was like, ‘now, now we’re doing it?'”
8. Andy Garcia’s character was added *after* the script was written:
This was done so Cher’s character could spot him on the balcony and shout, “Fernando!”
Parker told Awards Daily : “That was reverse engineering in its extreme form, 105 minutes of set up for that one joke.”
9. Julie Walters had to leave filming for a day to go meet Queen Elizebeth II:
While most of us skip work to get our nails done, Walters just casually went to Buckingham Palace to become a Dame.
Not too bad if you ask me.
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If that wasn’t cool enough, the sweetest thing happened when she got back.
The cast and crew surprised her with a touching rendition of “There Is Nothin’ Like a Dame.”
Sooo sweet! I bet working on that movie set was nothing short of magical.
10. An odd competition went down during the “Super Troupers” scene:
For some reason, the men in the film decided to see who could stuff the most things down their spandex trousers.
We shudder to think about who won. On the other hand…I’d like to see that.
11. A third movie is, thankfully, not out of the question:
The days of being a dancing queen may not be over yet!
Craymer gave fans hope back in June in a revealing interview with the Daily Mail .
“I think one day there will be another film, because there’s meant to be a trilogy, you see,” she said.
She added, “I know Universal would like me to do it.”
Additionally, Seyfried said she’d do a sequel ” in a heartbeat. “
Tell us: do you want a third film??
12. Pierce Brosnan’s family was worried about his singing:
Leave it up to your family to be brutally honest!
The actor told Good Housekeeping that when he sang for his family, they all cringed — including the housekeeper!
“They kept their opinions to themselves for a while, though. They didn’t want me to be discouraged,” he told the publication.
During this time, he kept practicing and getting better.
“Now my family seems to think I’m doing all right. But it’s possible they’re being nice. They’re probably still cringing,” he said.
We like your voice, Pierce!
