Angela Lansbury

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Angela Lansbury
from the trailer for The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945)
Born	Angela Brigid Lansbury October 16, 1925 (1925-10-16) (age 83) London, England, UK
Occupation	Actress, singer
Years active	1944 – present
Spouse(s)	Richard Cromwell (1945-1946) Peter Shaw (1949-2003)

Angela Brigid Lansbury, CBE (born October 16, 1925) is a British actress and singer whose career has spanned seven decades. Her first film appearance was in Gaslight (1944), for which she received an Academy Award nomination, and she expanded her repertoire to Broadway and television in the 1950s. Highly respected for her versatility, Lansbury has won five Tony Awards, six Golden Globes, and has been nominated for three Oscars and eighteen Emmys.

Her more popular films include The Manchurian Candidate (1962), Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971) and Beauty and the Beast (1991) and she was successful in such Broadway musicals as Gypsy, Mame and Sweeney Todd. Lansbury is more recently known for her role as mystery writer Jessica Fletcher on the U.S. television series Murder, She Wrote, in which she starred from 1984 until 1996.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Career 2.1 Theatre 2.2 Film and television 2.3 Honors 3 Personal life 4 Work 4.1 Filmography 4.2 Theatre 4.3 Television films 5 Awards and nominations 5.1 Academy Awards 5.2 BAFTA Awards 5.3 Golden Globes 5.4 Emmy Awards 5.5 Screen Actors Guild Awards 5.6 National Board of Review 5.7 Tony Awards 5.8 Drama Desk Awards 5.9 Drama League Awards 5.10 Hasty Pudding Theatricals 5.11 Television Critics Association Awards 5.12 CableACE Awards 6 See also 7 References 8 Notes 9 External links

[edit] Early life

Born in Poplar, London, England,^[1] Lansbury was the daughter of Belfast-born actress Moyna MacGill and Edgar Lansbury, a politician and prominent businessman, and the granddaughter of the former Labour Party leader George Lansbury. She is the older sister of producer Edgar Lansbury and a cousin of the late English animator and puppeteer Oliver Postgate (another grandchild of George Lansbury). Her cousin, the academic Coral Lansbury, was the mother of Australian federal Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull.

Her earliest theatrical influences were the teenage coloratura Deanna Durbin, screen star Irene Dunne, and Lansbury's mother, who encouraged her daughter's ambition by taking her to plays at the Old Vic and removing her from South Hampstead High School for Girls in order to enroll her in the Ritman School of Dancing and later the Webber-Douglas School of Singing and Dramatic Art (later the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art).

Following her father's death from stomach cancer, her mother became involved with a Scotsman named Leckie Forbes, and the two merged their families under one roof in Hampstead. A former colonel with the British Army in India, Forbes proved to be a jealous and suspicious tyrant who ruled the household with an iron hand. Just prior to the German bombing campaign of London, Lansbury's mother was presented with the opportunity to take her children to North America, and under cover of dark of night they fled from their unhappy home and sailed for Montreal, from there they headed to New York City. When her mother settled in Hollywood following a fund-raising Canadian tour of a Noel Coward play, Lansbury (and later her brothers) joined her there.

Lansbury worked at the Bullocks Wilshire department store in Los Angeles. At one of the frequent parties her mother hosted for British émigré performers in their Laurel Canyon home, she met would-be actor Michael Dyne, who arranged for her to meet Mel Ballerino, the casting director for the upcoming film adaptation of Oscar Wilde's novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. Ballerino was casting Gaslight with Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer, as well, and he offered her the role of the impertinent and slightly malevolent maid Nancy. She was nominated for an Academy Award for her 1944 film debut, and the following year garnered another nomination for her portrayal of Sibyl Vane in The Picture of Dorian Gray.

[edit] Career

[edit] Theatre

On Broadway, Lansbury received good reviews from her first musical outing, the short-lived 1964 Stephen Sondheim musical Anyone Can Whistle, which co-starred Lee Remick. Two years later, she was offered what proved to be the biggest triumph of her theatrical career, the title role in Mame, Jerry Herman's musical adaptation of the novel and subsequent film Auntie Mame, which had starred Rosalind Russell. Opening at the Winter Garden Theater on 24 May 1966, Mame ran for 1508 performances. Lansbury's portrayal, opposite Bea Arthur as Vera Charles, earned her the Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical. She and Arthur became life-long friends. In addition, Lansbury's version of one of the play's songs, "We Need A Little Christmas", became the definitive version, and has received substantial radio air-play around Christmas time every year since its release.

Lansbury won additional Tony Awards for Dear World (1969), the first Broadway revival of Gypsy (1974), and her English music hall turn as meat pie entrepreneur Mrs. Lovett in Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd (1979). In a television interview with Robert Osborne on Turner Classic Movies aired in August 2006, Lansbury stated that, theatrically, she feels she would "most like to be remembered for this role".

In 1971, Lansbury accepted the title role in the Jule Styne – Bob Merrill musical Prettybelle. After a difficult rehearsal period, the show opened to brutal reviews in Boston, where it closed within a week. In 1982, a recording of the show was released by Varese Sarabande which included most of the original cast and Lansbury's 11 o'clock number "When I'm Drunk, I'm Beautiful" along with "You Never Looked Better", a song removed early in the run.

She had been announced for the lead role in the Kander-Ebb musical The Visit, to open on Broadway in 2001, but withdrew from the show before it opened because of her husband's health.^[2]

Lansbury returned to the Broadway stage for the first time in more than 25 years in Deuce, a play by Terrence McNally, co-starring Marian Seldes. The play opened at the Music Box Theatre in May 2007 in a limited run of eighteen weeks. Lansbury received a Tony Award nomination in the category of Leading Actress in a Play for her role in this production. In October 2008, she was cast as Madame Arcati in the revival of Blithe Spirit, which opened at the Shubert Theatre in March 2009. The New York Times praised her performance, but described the show as "uneven".^[3] Both Deuce and Blithe Spirit were directed by Michael Blakemore. Lansbury won numerous awards for her performance, including the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play (her fifth win).^[4]

[edit] Film and television

Lansbury has enjoyed a long and varied career, often in roles older than her actual age, appearing in such films as Samson and Delilah (1949) and Disney's Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971). She appeared as Alvera Dunlear in the 1963 episode "Something Crazy's Going on in the Back Room" episode of the NBC medical drama about psychiatry, The Eleventh Hour. A notable film was The Manchurian Candidate (1962) in which she played Mrs. Iselin, the cold-blooded mother of a war veteran brainwashed into becoming a Communist assassin. She won much critical praise for her performance, and received her third Oscar nomination. (Lucille Ball had been considered for the role; a decade later, Ball coincidentally landed the title role in the film version of Mame, the role Lansbury had created on Broadway.) On CNN's Larry King Live, Lansbury said that her character in The Manchurian Candidate was her favorite of her many film roles.^[5]

Lansbury's popularity from and association with Mame on Broadway in the '60s had her very much in demand everywhere in the media. Ever the humanitarian, she used her fame as an opportunity to benefit others wherever possible. For example, when appearing as a mystery guest on the popular Sunday night CBS-TV show, What's My Line?, she made an impassioned plea for viewers to contribute to the 1966 Muscular Dystrophy Association fundraising drive, chaired by Jerry Lewis.

After many years performing on Broadway and in the West End, Lansbury returned to film in Death on the Nile (1978), and portrayed Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in The Mirror Crack'd (1980). She began doing character voice work shortly thereafter in animated films from The Last Unicorn (1982) to Anastasia (1997); her most famous voice work is the singing teapot Mrs. Potts in the Disney film Beauty and the Beast (1991), in which she performed the title song written by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. She reprised the role in Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997) and in the Square-Enix video game Kingdom Hearts II (2006). In 2005, Lansbury appeared in Nanny McPhee as great aunt Adelaide, her first theatrical film role since The Company of Wolves (1984).

While Lansbury has won every Tony Award for which she has been nominated (with the exception of her nomination for Deuce in 2007), she has not been a recipent of an Academy Award or an Emmy Award. She has been thrice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and holds the record for the most primetime Emmy nominations (twelve) as Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. However, she has received several other prominent awards, including the People's Choice and Golden Globe. Lansbury is tied with Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep for most Golden Globe Award wins with six each.

In 1983, Lansbury starred opposite Laurence Olivier in a BBC adaptation of the Broadway play A Talent for Murder, which she described as "a rushed job" in which she solely participated to work with Olivier.^[6] Subsequent to this performance, Lansbury continued to work in the mystery genre, and achieved fame greater than at any other time in her career as novelist Jessica Fletcher on the U.S. television series Murder, She Wrote (1984 – 1996). It became one of the longest-running detective drama series in television history and made her one of the highest paid actresses in the world. She assumed ownership of the series in 1991 and acted as executive producer from that season onward.

[edit] Honors

In 1994, Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom appointed her a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.^[7] She was named a Disney Legend in 1995. She received a Screen Actors Guild Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997, Kennedy Center Honors in 2000, and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

She has received these additional honors and recognition:

• the New Dramatists Lifetime Achievement Award on May 16, 2000.^[8]
• the Acting Company's First Lifetime Achievement Award on November 11, 2002.^[9]
• the Actor's Fund of America Lifetime Achievement on October 30, 2004.^[10]
• the degree Doctor of Humane Letters honoris causa from the University of Miami on May 9, 2008. She was also the guest speaker at the commencement ceremony.^[11]
• George and Ira Gershwin Award for Lifetime Musical Achievement, UCLA Spring Sing.^[12]

[edit] Personal life

In 1945, Lansbury married American actor Richard Cromwell when he was 35 and she was 19. Unbeknownst to her, Cromwell was bisexual, and the marriage dissolved after a year, but the two remained friends.

In 1949, Lansbury married British-born actor and businessman Peter Shaw, who was a former boyfriend of Joan Crawford. Shaw was instrumental in guiding and managing Lansbury's career. Until his death in January 2003, they enjoyed one of the longest show-business marriages on record.

Lansbury is the mother of two, stepmother of one, and a grandmother several times over. In an interview with Barbara Walters, Lansbury revealed a firestorm that destroyed the family's Malibu home in September 1970 was a blessing in disguise, as it prompted a move to a rural area of County Cork in Ireland, where her children were separated from the hard drugs with which they had been experimenting. Her son Anthony Shaw, after a brief fling with acting, became producer/director of Murder, She Wrote and presently is a television executive and director. Her only daughter Deirdre and son-in-law, a chef, are restaurateurs in West Los Angeles.

Lansbury was related to the late Sir Peter Ustinov by her half-sister Isolde's marriage to the British actor (they divorced in 1946). The two former in-laws appeared together professionally just once, in 1978's Death on the Nile. Lansbury is related by marriage to actress Ally Sheedy, wife of her nephew David Lansbury. Both her brothers, twins Edgar and Bruce, are successful theater producers (Edgar Lansbury was instrumental in bringing Godspell to Broadway, and Bruce Lansbury was also a television producer, notably for shows like Mission: Impossible).

She had knee replacement surgery on 14 July 2005.^[13]

Lansbury was a long-time resident of Brentwood, California, and supported various philanthropic groups in Southern California. In 2006, Lansbury moved to New York City, purchasing a condominium at a reported cost of $2 million. The following year she returned to Broadway in Deuce.^[14]

Lansbury's papers are currently housed at the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University.^[15]

[edit] Work

[edit] Filmography

Year Title 1944 Gaslight 1944 National Velvet 1945 The Picture of Dorian Gray 1946 The Harvey Girls 1946 The Hoodlum Saint 1946 Till the Clouds Roll By 1947 The Private Affairs of Bel Ami 1947 If Winter Comes 1948 State of the Union 1948 The Three Musketeers 1948 Tenth Avenue Angel 1949 The Red Danube 1949 Samson and Delilah 1951 Kind Lady 1952 Mutiny 1953 Remains to Be Seen 1954 A Life at Stake 1955 The Purple Mask 1955 A Lawless Street 1956 The Court Jester 1956 Please Murder Me 1958 The Long, Hot Summer 1958 The Reluctant Debutante 1959 Summer of the Seventeenth Doll 1960 The Dark at the Top of the Stairs 1960 A Breath of Scandal

Year Title 1961 Blue Hawaii 1962 Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse 1962 All Fall Down 1962 The Manchurian Candidate 1963 In the Cool of the Day 1964 The World of Henry Orient 1964 Dear Heart 1965 The Greatest Story Ever Told 1965 The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders 1965 Harlow 1966 Mister Buddwing 1970 Something for Everyone 1971 Bedknobs and Broomsticks 1978 Death on the Nile 1979 The Lady Vanishes 1980 The Mirror Crack'd 1982 The Last Unicorn 1983 The Pirates of Penzance 1984 Ingrid 1984 The Company of Wolves 1991 Beauty and the Beast 1997 Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas 1997 Anastasia 1999 Fantasia 2000 2003 Broadway: The Golden Age, by the Legends Who Were There 2005 Nanny McPhee

[edit] Theatre

Title	Venue	Duration in production
Hotel Paradiso	Broadway	April – July 1957
A Taste of Honey	Broadway	October 1960 – May 1961[16]
Anyone Can Whistle	Broadway	April 1964
Mame	Broadway	May 1966 – March 1968 (through August 1968 on tour)[17]
Dear World	Broadway	February 1969 – May 1969
Prettybelle	Boston	February 1971
All Over	West End	1972
Gypsy	West End; Broadway	May 1973 – March 1974; September 1974 – January 1975
The King and I	Broadway	April 1978
Sweeney Todd	Broadway	March 1979 – March 1980 (US tour commenced October 1980)[18]
A Little Family Business	Broadway	December 1982
Mame	Broadway	July – August 1983
Deuce	Broadway	April – August 2007
Blithe Spirit	Broadway	March 2009 -

[edit] Television films

Year	Title
1982	Little Gloria... Happy at Last
1983	The Gift of Love: A Christmas Story
1984	A Talent for Murder
1984	Lace
1986	Rage of Angels: The Story Continues
1989	The Shell Seekers
1990	The Love She Sought
1992	Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris
1996	Mrs. Santa Claus
1997	Murder, She Wrote: South by Southwest
1999	The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax
2000	Murder, She Wrote: A Story to Die For
2001	Murder, She Wrote: The Last Free Man
2003	Murder, She Wrote: The Celtic Riddle
2004	The Blackwater Lightship
2008	Heidi 4 Paws

[edit] Awards and nominations

[edit] Academy Awards

Nominations

• Best Supporting Actress (Gaslight, 1945)
• Best Supporting Actress (The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1946)
• Best Supporting Actress (The Manchurian Candidate, 1963)

[edit] BAFTA Awards

Wins

• Britannia Award (Lifetime Achievement, 2003)

Nominations

• Best Supporting Actress (Death on the Nile, 1978)

[edit] Golden Globes

Wins

• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1992)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1990)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1987)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1985)
• Best Supporting Actress - Drama (The Manchurian Candidate, 1963)
• Best Supporting Actress - Drama (The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1946)

Nominations

• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1995)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1993)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1991)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1989)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1988)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1986)
• Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Miniseries or TV-Movie (A Gift of Love: A Christmas Story, 1984)
• Best Motion Picture Actress - Musical/Comedy (Bedknobs and Broomsticks, 1972)
• Best Motion Picture Actress - Musical/Comedy (Something for Everyone, 1971)

[edit] Emmy Awards

Nominations

• Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series (for playing Eleanor Duvall in "Law & Order: Trial by Jury", 2005)
• Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie (The Blackwater Lightship, 2004)
• Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series ("Murder, She Wrote", 1985-1996) (12 Consecutive Nominations)
• Outstanding Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program ("The 43rd Annual Tony Awards", 1990)
• Outstanding Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program ("The 41st Annual Tony Awards", 1987)
• Outstanding Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program (Sweeney Todd, 1985)
• Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or Movie (Little Gloria... Happy at Last, 1983)

[edit] Screen Actors Guild Awards

Wins

• Life Achievement Award (1996)

Nominations

• Best Performance by an Actress in a TV-Series - Drama ("Murder, She Wrote", 1995)

[edit] National Board of Review

Wins

• Best Supporting Actress (Death on the Nile, 1978)
• Best Supporting Actress (All Fall Down and The Manchurian Candidate, 1962)

[edit] Tony Awards

Wins

• Best Featured Actress in a Play, Blithe Spirit, 2009
• Best Actress in a Musical, Sweeney Todd, 1979
• Best Actress in a Musical, Gypsy, 1975
• Best Actress in a Musical, Dear World, 1969
• Best Actress in a Musical, Mame, 1966

Nominations

• Best Actress in a Play, Deuce, 2007

[edit] Drama Desk Awards

Wins

• Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play, (Blithe Spirit, 2009)
• Outstanding Actress in a Musical, (Sweeney Todd, 1979)
• Outstanding Actress in a Musical, (Gypsy, 1975)

Nominations

• Outstanding Actress in a Musical, (The King and I, 1978)

[edit] Drama League Awards

Wins

• The Unique Contribution to the Theatre Award (2009)

Nominations

• The Distinguished Performance Award, (Blithe Spirit, 2009)

[edit] Hasty Pudding Theatricals

Wins

• Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year (1968)

[edit] Television Critics Association Awards

Wins

• Career Achievement Award (1996)

[edit] CableACE Awards

Wins

• Actress in a Theatrical or Musical Program (Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1982)(TV)(musical), 1983)

[edit] See also

• List of British actresses
• Other 1925 births

[edit] References

• Gottfried, Martin (1999). Balancing Act: The Authorized Biography of Angela Lansbury. New York: Little, Brown & Company. ISBN 0-316-32225-3. 

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Angela Lansbury

• Angela Lansbury at the Internet Broadway Database
• Angela Lansbury at the Internet Movie Database
• Angela Lansbury at the TCM Movie Database
• Angela Lansbury at TV.com
• Angela Lansbury at the British Film Institute's Screenonline
• Archive of American television interview with Angela Lansbury in 15 September 1998 on Google Video
• Angela Lansbury on American Theatre Wing's Downstage Center
• Angela Lansbury Collection at Boston University

v • d • e Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture Katina Paxinou (1943) · Agnes Moorehead (1944) · Angela Lansbury (1945) · Anne Baxter (1946) · Celeste Holm (1947) · Ellen Corby (1948) · Mercedes McCambridge (1949) · Josephine Hull (1950) · Kim Hunter (1951) · Katy Jurado (1952) · Grace Kelly (1953) · Jan Sterling (1954) · Marisa Pavan (1955) · Eileen Heckart (1956) · Elsa Lanchester (1957) · Hermione Gingold (1958) · Susan Kohner (1959) · Janet Leigh (1960) Complete List · (1943–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001–present)

v • d • e Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture Rita Moreno (1961) · Angela Lansbury (1962) · Margaret Rutherford (1963) · Agnes Moorehead (1964) · Ruth Gordon (1965) · Jocelyne LaGarde (1966) · Carol Channing (1967) · Ruth Gordon (1968) · Goldie Hawn (1969) · Karen Black/Maureen Stapleton (1970) · Ann-Margret (1971) · Shelley Winters (1972) · Linda Blair (1973) · Karen Black (1974) · Brenda Vaccaro (1975) · Katharine Ross (1976) · Vanessa Redgrave (1977) · Dyan Cannon (1978) · Meryl Streep (1979) · Mary Steenburgen (1980) Complete List · (1943–1960) · (1961–1980) · (1981–2000) · (2001–present)

v • d • e Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical 1948-1975 Grace Hartman (1948) · Nanette Fabray (1949) · Mary Martin (1950) · Ethel Merman (1951) · Gertrude Lawrence (1952) · Rosalind Russell (1953) · Dolores Gray (1954) · Mary Martin (1955) · Gwen Verdon (1956) · Judy Holliday (1957) · Thelma Ritter/ Gwen Verdon (1958) · Gwen Verdon (1959) · Mary Martin (1960) · Elizabeth Seal (1961) · Anna Maria Alberghetti/ Diahann Carroll (1962) · Vivien Leigh (1963) · Carol Channing (1964) · Liza Minnelli (1965) · Angela Lansbury (1966) · Barbara Harris (1967) · Patricia Routledge/ Leslie Uggams (1968) · Angela Lansbury (1969) · Lauren Bacall (1970) · Helen Gallagher (1971) · Alexis Smith (1972) · Glynis Johns (1973) · Virginia Capers (1974) · Angela Lansbury (1975) 1976-2000 Donna McKechnie (1976) · Dorothy Loudon (1977) · Liza Minnelli (1978) · Angela Lansbury (1979) · Patti LuPone (1980) · Lauren Bacall (1981) · Jennifer Holliday (1982) · Natalia Makarova (1983) · Chita Rivera (1984) · Bernadette Peters (1986) · Maryann Plunkett (1987) · Joanna Gleason (1988) · Ruth Brown (1989) · Tyne Daly (1990) · Lea Salonga (1991) · Faith Prince (1992) · Chita Rivera (1993) · Donna Murphy (1994) · Glenn Close (1995) · Donna Murphy (1996) · Bebe Neuwirth (1997) · Natasha Richardson (1998) · Bernadette Peters (1999) · Heather Headley (2000) 2001-Present Christine Ebersole (2001) · Sutton Foster (2002) · Marissa Jaret Winokur (2003) · Idina Menzel (2004) · Victoria Clark (2005) · LaChanze (2006) · Christine Ebersole (2007) · Patti LuPone (2008) · Alice Ripley (2009) Complete list · (1948-1975) · (1976-2000) · (2001-present)

v • d • e Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play Blair Brown (2000) · Viola Davis (2001) · Katie Finneran (2002) · Michele Pawk (2003) · Audra McDonald (2004) · Adriane Lenox (2005) · Frances de la Tour (2006) · Jennifer Ehle (2007) · Rondi Reed (2008) · Angela Lansbury (2009) Complete list: (1947-1975) · (1976-2000) · (2001-present)

Persondata
NAME	Lansbury, Angela
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Lansbury, Angela Brigid
SHORT DESCRIPTION	English actress
DATE OF BIRTH	16 October 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH	London, England
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH