Dick Van Dyke went on The Masked Singer. The Masked Singer had Dick Van Dyke. They brought Dick Van Dyke out to play a gigantic, slightly frightening gnome who sings Billie Holiday. This is a topsy-turvy world we live in. Season nine of the Fox TV show premiered on February 15, revealing the Mustang (country singer Sara Evans) and the Gnome, who turned out to be the 97-year-old, EG_T-winning, definition-of-iconic Mary Poppins and The Dick Van Dyke Show star. This is a man who knows Julie Andrews! “I would say it’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever done,†Dyke told Entertainment Weekly ahead of the reveal. “It was a weird experience. I had two little peepholes I can see the audience with. It’s a good thing I’m not claustrophobic.â€
Dyke sang “When You’re Smiling,†by Frank Sinatra, per the show, but if you ask Dyke, he was doing Billie Holiday’s “When You’re Smiling.†“I didn’t realize that Frank Sinatra had even done it,†he continued to EW. The Gnome’s reveal turned panelist Nicole Scherzinger into a puddle of tears, like the musical-theater lover she is. “I love Dick Van Dyke,†she exclaimed, while Ken Jeong added, “You’re one of the reasons I got into comedy.†Even Jenny McCarthy Wahlberg was “blown away.†Wait ’til you find out what “A Spoonful of Sugar†is actually about, Jenny.