Video: THE SOUND OF MUSIC Spotlighted on TODAY for 60th Anniversary

The Sound of Music, the 1965 hit film based on the Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway musical, is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year. To commemorate the occasion, the TODAY Show dedicated a segment to the iconic film on Friday, taking viewers to Salzburg, where the movie was filmed and the real events took place.

For the show, NBC's Molly Hunter visited some of the famous locations as part of the "My Favorite Things" experience, which included the Rosewood Schloss Fuschl retreat and the home where the real Georg and Maria Von Trapp fell in love. 

"She was amazing," granddaughter Elizabeth Von Trapp said of Maria, who was played by Julie Andrews in the film. "I would say that her enthusiasm, her imagination, and her storytelling were amazing," she said, adding that the way Andrews portrayed Maria's playfulness in the movie was "spot-on." Check out the behind-the-scenes look here.

On screen, the Robert Wise–directed film, starring Julie Andrews (‘Maria’) and Christopher Plummer (‘Captain von Trapp’), broke box-office records to become the highest-grossing movie of 1965 (ultimately earning over $280 million worldwide) and swept the 38th Academy Awards with five Oscars – including Best Picture and Best Scoring of Music – plus multiple Golden Globe Awards. The movie’s initial U.S. release lasted four-and-a-half years, and from 1966 to 1972, The Sound of Music was cited by Variety as the “All-Time Box Office Champion.” In 2001, the United States Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the National Film Registry, finding it “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”

Global celebrations are planned throughout 2025 to celebrate the film’s Diamond anniversary. A restored and remastered 4K presentation of the film returns to U.S. cinemas on September 13, 14 and 17 via Fathom’s Big Screen Classics series, with international screening dates to be announced shortly. The Walt Disney Film Restoration team worked meticulously for nine months to digitally enhance the film, cleaning up dirt, warping and film grain issues to present the film in enhanced visual and audio glory. 

2025 will also see a North American tour of the stage musical. Directed by Jack O'Brien, the tour will star Tony Award nominee Christiane Noll as the Mother Abbess, along with rising star Cayleigh Capaldi as Maria Rainer and Broadway veteran Kevin Earley as Captain Georg von Trapp. Learn more about the production here.