Angela Lansbury Appreciation: This Titan of Stage, Film and TV Moved Generations of Fans
th century and a decent chunk of the 21st, Angela Lansbury did it all — drama, comedy, musical, stage, screen, warm, terrifying — and she did it brilliantly.Born in London in 1925, she fled the Blitz in 1940 and came to New York to study acting. By 1942, she’d signed with MGM in Los Angeles and immediately appeared in three films that remain classics to this day: “Gaslight” and “The Picture of Dorian Gray” (both of which earned her Oscar nominations) as well as “National Velvet.” She was anything but sweetness and light during her years at the studio, playing the yin to Judy Garland’s sweet yang in “The Harvey Girls” as well as the unfaithful Queen Anne in “The Three Musketeers” (1948), but she ultimately felt disappointed in the roles offered her and dissolved her contract in 1952.The rest of the decade involved having children, doing some stage and TV work, as well as roles in a smattering of films, the most memorable being “The Court Jester,” “The Long Hot Summer” and “The Reluctant Debutante.” But Lansbury’s screen career burned hot anew in the 1960s, since her level of poise and intensity made her a favorite for filmmakers who cast her as characters older than she was.