Angela Lansbury Dies: Beloved ‘Murder, She Wrote’ Star, Icon Of Film, Stage & Television Was 96
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Angela Lansbury, one of the most beloved and acclaimed actors of stage, film and television, who had a nearly 75-year career, died October 11in her sleep at her Los Angeles home, just five days short of her 97th birthday.
The three-time Oscar nominee and Murder, She Wrote star’s death was announced by her family.
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“The children of Dame Angela Lansbury are sad to announce that their mother died peacefully in her sleep at home in Los Angeles at 1:30 AM today, Tuesday, October 11, 2022, just five days shy of her 97th birthday,” the statement reads.
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She is known to television fans as the star of the long-running smash Murder, She Wrote — she was Emmy-nominated for each of its 12 seasons — to Broadway fans as the definitive Auntie Mame and to film buffs for enduring performances in The Manchurian Candidate, her breakthrough Gaslight and the voice of Mrs. Potts in Disney’s animated Beauty and the Beast, among a vast number of other roles. Lansbury enjoyed one of the longest and most acclaimed acting careers in Hollywood and New York.
Lansbury arguably achieved her most widespread fame as the star of one of the most popular series in TV history: As super-sleuth Jessica Fletcher, Lansbury solved crimes for 12 seasons on Murder, She Wrote. The lighthearted mystery drama ran from 1984-96, landing in the Top 10 for eight of those seasons and the Top 15 for the first 11.
She was Emmy nominated 18 times, including for Lead Actress in a Drama for every season of Murder, She Wrote, but never took home the trophy. Her final nomination came in 2005 for an unforgettable performance on a crossover episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and Law & Order: Trial by Jury. Harkening back to The Manchurian Candidate, Lansbury played yet another malicious matriarch, the powerful and overprotective Eleanor Duvall, mother of a serial rapist played by Alfred Molina.
Born on October 16, 1925, in London, Lansbury moved to the United States in 1940 and to Hollywood in 1942, where she signed to MGM and within two years made her debut as a maid in the classic psychological thriller Gaslight, starring Ingrid Bergman. The following year Lansbury appeared in The Picture of Dorian Gray, and she received Oscar nominations for both performances.
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She received her third Oscar nomination for the performance in what would become perhaps her most memorable movie role: The monstrous, cutthroat mother of a political neophyte in The Manchurian Candidate. Other notable film credits of the era include The Long, Hot Summer (1958), All Fall Down (1962), and, later in the ’60s, The World of Henry Orient and The Greatest Story Ever Told.
The 1970s would bring many more film roles, including in Death on the Nile and The Mirror Crack’d. To generations of kids, Lansbury will be remembered for performances in Disney classics Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971) and, perhaps most indelibly, 1991’s Beauty and the Beast, in which she voiced the kindhearted teapot Mrs. Potts and sang the title song and the whimsical “Be Our Guest.”
The Beauty and the Beast soundtrack was nominated for a Grammy and hit the Top 20 on the Billboard 200. At the 1992 Academy Awards, Lansbury was joined onstage by Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson — whose duet version of “Beauty and the Beast” had been a top 10 single — to preform a hybrid version of the tune. It went on to win Best Original Song for Alan Menken and Howard Ashman.
Lansbury received an Honorary Oscar at the 2014 Governor Awards. The Academy called her “an entertainment icon who has created some of cinema’s most memorable characters, inspiring generations of actors.”
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Lansbury conquered Broadway as well, earning a Tony Award — her first of five spanning 43 years — for her performance in the title role of Mame (1966). Subsequent stage roles would include such seminal productions as Gypsy, Sweeney Todd and The King and I.
Lansbury made her Broadway debut in 1957, appearing in the short-lived Hotel Paradiso. In 1960 she appeared in the Tony Richardson-directed A Taste of Honey, and, in ’64, Anyone Can Whistle. Following her legendary performance in Mame, she appeared in Dear World (1969), a 1974 revival of Gypsy, 1977’s The King and I, and — in what would become yet another signature stage role — as Mrs. Lovett in 1979’s Sweeney Todd.
She continued her Broadway career through the 1980s with A Little Family Business and a Mame revival. She largely was absent from the stage throughout the run of Murder, She Wrote, returning in 2007’s Deuce by Terrence McNally. She received a Tony nomination for the performance.
She won her fifth Tony for the 2009 revival of Blithe Spirit, in which she played Madame Arcati. Also in 2009 she co-starred opposite Catherine Zeta-Jones in the Broadway revival of A Little Night Music, receiving her seventh Tony nomination. She gave her final Broadway performance in 2012 in Gore Vidal’s The Best Man.
In all, Lansbury won Tonys for Mame (1966), Dear World (1969), Gypsy (1975), Sweeney Todd (1979) and Blithe Spirit (2009). She received the Lifetime Achievement Tony Award in 2022.
In a statement today, Heather Hitchens, president and CEO of the American Theatre Wing, which so-presents the Tonys, said, “The American Theatre Wing mourns the loss of our Honorary Chair, Angela Lansbury, whose involvement with the Wing spanned 8 astonishing decades. She first entered our world as a student of the American Theatre Wing Professional School, and then graced the stage with an unrivaled string of unforgettable performances. She won 5 Tony Awards and a Special Tony for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre just this past June and hosted 5 Tony Award telecasts; the most in the history of the awards. As our Honorary Chair, she was a passionate advocate for the next generation of theatre makers. Rest in power, dear friend! You will be deeply, deeply missed.”
In 2014, Lansbury was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II.
She is survived by three children, Anthony, Deirdre and David; three grandchildren, Peter, Katherine and Ian; five great-grandchildren; and her brother, producer Edgar Lansbury. She was predeceased by her husband of 53 years, Peter Shaw.
A private family ceremony will be held at a date to be determined.
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