Mary Poppins Scene 9 Summary

Floaters

  • Mary leads the children outside, as they head on errands. A little dog runs up and barks at Mary—Mary seems to understand his language. The dog leads them down the sidewalk.
  • They arrive at the house of Mary's Uncle Albert. Bert's already there.
  • They walk into a room where Albert is floating up by the ceiling. Apparently he has some sort of condition (disorder?), where he laughs and starts floating in the air. He keeps cracking up.
  • Albert starts singing the song, "I Love to Laugh." Everyone else starts cracking up too. Mary and Bert sing verses too.
  • Bert laughs so much that he starts floating in the air as well. Michael and Jane start to float too, but Mary drags them back down.
  • Soon, Michael and Jane are up in the air, laughing, anyway.
  • Only Mary remains earthbound.
  • Bert and Albert tell each other terrible jokes and continue guffawing and floating.
  • A table set for tea floats in the air, and Mary relents and floats up with them.
  • They have tea in the middle of the air, as Bert and Albert's intentionally bad jokes continue.
  • Michael asks if there's a way to get down. Albert explains there is—you need to think of something sad.
  • Albert starts talking about a cat that got run over, and the children start moving back to the floor. But Albert turns it into a joke, so they stay floating.
  • Mary gets tired of all this, so she makes them all float back to earth through her magic powers. She leaves with the children.
  • Albert cries because he's sad to see them go, while Bert sticks around and commiserates.