Angela Lansbury - any dirt?

I, too, am interested in any info on Madame Fletcher.

She was a regular on my glass coffee table.

There is no dirt, not even a smidgeon in a career going back to the 1940s. She is nice and polite indeed, and intelligent as well. A total pro and a very decent human being.

Even her neighbors in Ballycotton have nice things to say about her

She had a fling with Jason Beghe on the set of "Murder, She Wrote."

First husband was family.

Supposedly she was a huge bitch on the set of Gaslight. She often came to the set drunk and then she made fun of Ingrid Bergman's heavily accented English, she pulled Charles Boyer's toupee from his head, called George Cukor "the F word" and nicknamed Dame May Whitty "a second rate Edna May Oliver". Her co-stars often went home in tears.

-one of her sons hung out with the Charles Manson cult before the murders -Lansbury and Jerry Herman campaigned hard to get Judy Garland to replace her in Mame in '68, but producer David Merrick shot them down saying that Judy couldn't handle a the grind of BWay show in the state she was in. -one of her husbands, actor Richard Cromwell, was gay

Allegedly she and Bea Arthur didn't get along at all

She's known for her matching her accent to where she's living - the US, the UK, and Ireland. Not to be trusted.

I think she pretty honest and I don't think she ever pretended to be easy. Anyway, she must have one foot in the grave by now.

She's known to swear like a sailor.

She was easy in Dorian Gray.

Neil Patrick Harris wrote in his book they had sex in her dressing room.

Ha ha. You'll be asking for the moon on a stick next, OP.

No, it was bed knobs and broomsticks, R15.

Her daughter owns a restaurant in L.A.

She kicked my dog.

Angela's late husband Peter Shaw was quite the hottie in in his day. Her son Peter looks like Ray Liotta.

Angela and Bea Arthur were best friends.

R8, David Merrick did not produce MAME.

But I'll bet he told people he did.

She made meat pies out of poor defenseless Cockneys with a smashing Len Cariou.

Sorry you missed the opening night.

She was nominated for an Oscar seventy (70 !) years ago. Now that's a career.

So young!

Angela is a consumate professional. Her NYC digs? A modest pied a terre somewhere near Central Park South.

Her son used to go to her Mame dressing room and ask for money to purchase drugs.

Was on the receiving end of many a golden shower from Mr. C, Tom Bosley, backstage on MSW.

Posed naked once in the early 1990's:

She did NOT do her own singing in "The Harvey Girls"!!!!!

At first I thought "hey she was cute" and then I realized that is a dead bird on her hat. That bird looks like a cat killed it and they glued it to her hat. So gross.

She'd often perform back alley abortions with Dolly Sinatra.

I was disturbed, here's the dead bird hat.

She continuously lies about her age. It's 1922, Then 1924, then 1926. Next, 1952.

She is starring in Blithe Spirit at the Ahmanson in LA starting soon.

R9, you couldn't be more wrong. Where did you hear that?

We owe her thank you notes for the roles she turned down that led to us winning Oscars.

She has worked with just about everybody - I like her with Rex Harrison and Kay Kendall in the 1958 Reluctant Debutante where she is another bitch on wheels, just like she is in A Breath of Scandal in 1960 with Sophia Loren.

I like her early 60s mothers: Elvis's, Warren Beatty's, Larry Harvey's (though she was only a few years older than him) and that bitch mother in the Peter Sellers film The World of Henry Orient.

Nice that all her old MGM pals turn up in the Murder She Wrote series - I never watched them at the time, as not my thing then, but its amusing seeing who is in them now, as the likes of Janet Leigh, Jean Simmons, Ruth Roman, etc turn up. English actor Keith Mitchell seems to play a gay pal of hers in some episodes.

[quote]Posed naked once in the early 1990's:

That looks more like Margaret Whiting.

The nude shot cracks me up.

She once shot a man in Reno. But she missed him and killed his dog instead. But that was okay because that man was going to fuck that dog.

True story.

Why was she so good at playing bitches ? - even when young, being nasty to Judy Garland in The Harvey Girls or playing much older than she was opposite Spencer Tracy and Kate Hepburn in State of The Union in 1948.

And she is a right bitch as the impoverished baroness in the very gay black comedy Something For Everyone in 1970, with Michael York, by Hal Prince. Maybe her first leading role.

I got stuck in an elevator once with her and Ruth Chatterton (of all people) once. We were in there for close to an hour and a half. What an experience that was!

True story

She was once offered a role as a lesbian. Without reading the script, she turned down the part flat. Saying "I have to think about my fans"

That might have been the film of The Killing Of Sr George, r45. heard that story too. I can't think what other lesbian role of note she would have been offered in 1968.

R46 yes it was that movie I was referring to

She would no doubt have been terrific in it, but glad the part went to Beryl Reid who created it and was just right.

There have been suggestions that she wasn't such a good mother since her kids were such messes in the 1960s and 1970s. Not sure how much of that is fair.

Well r49 she can't have been at home much, like now in her late 80s still going out to work! All those movies, stage roles (she did Gypsy and Albee's All Over and Albert Finney's Hamlet in London, let alone those Mames etc), and then that endless tv series, and now back on stage again and touring as well! They will have to shoot her eventually. No one works like that at her age.

Worst Pies in London!

Sooooo, r44, tell us what she was like!

Peggy Ashcroft was a big favorite to win a best supporting actress academy award in 1985 but she couldn't attend the ceremony because she went to Michael Redgrave's funeral.

The story goes that Ashcroft instructed her The Passage to India co-star Victor Banerjee to accept the oscar in her behalf but the academy didn't want that for some reason and told Lansbury to accept Ashcroft's oscar. Apparently Banerjee and Ashcroft were shocked by this decision.

The video of Angela accepting the oscar is a little strange because it takes Angela more than ten seconds to even get out of her chair and head for the stage after the winner is announced. It almost looks as if she waited to see if anyone else is gonna get up and claim the oscar.

Oh GOD R29!

I can see her dirty pillows!

R29, was that the scene edited out of the Manchurian Candidate for which a mere kiss was substituted between mother and son?

R30

Not only did AL not do her own singing the dubbing was so out of sync it was like watching a Godzilla film.

First time one saw The Harvey girls granted it was on television but couldn't understand why words seem to come several seconds after AL moved her mouth.

Why was Miss. Lansbury dubbed anyway? She does have a decent enough singing voice.

I'm really looking forward to catching Dame Angie in 'Blithe Spirit' next month in LA - missed her performance on Broadway and happened to be in London one week before her West End run started earlier this year. I know it's a supporting role, but it's a significant one. I hope I have her energy when I'm in my 60s, let alone approaching 90.

"The story goes that Ashcroft instructed her The Passage to India co-star Victor Banerjee to accept the oscar in her behalf but the academy didn't want that for some reason and told Lansbury to accept Ashcroft's oscar. Apparently Banerjee and Ashcroft were shocked by this decision."

Victor accepted Dame Peggy's Golden Globe Award two months earlier for the same movie.

There is some rule that a co-star cannot accept an Oscar for the eventual winner.

That was one reason Joan Crawford accepted the Oscar for Anne Bancroft.

Anne wanted her co-star Patty Duke to accept for her, but the Academy said no.

I assume that was the same reason for Victor being unable to accept for Dame Peggy.

She is the granddaughter of George Lansbury, one of the founders of the Labor Party in England. It was rather urgent that she leave England during WWII because of their politics and the possibility of a Nazi invasion. She fits in very well with the Hollywood left fringe.

Just saw Dame Angela in Blithe Spirit. She was total knock out. Her comedic timing is perfect and she is clearly having a great time on stage. Rest of the cast - including Lady Edith's lover from Downton Abbey - were universally excellent, but the production really belongs to Angie. What a marvelous performance. Might return to the Ahmanson one more time before the run ends.

She just found out yesterday that she's mentioned in a 90s reggae song:

"Angela Lansbury — the 93-year-old actress best known for playing the writer-turned-detective Jessica Fletcher on the long-running TV show, Murder, She Wrote — gave her official seal of approval to famed reggae duo Chaka Demus and Plier’s 1993 hit, also titled “Murder She Wrote.”"

Who do you think taught Bea Arthur that the best way to get back at a rival was to pinch a loaf on the floor of their dressing room?

She gave money to Charles Manson through her daughter DeeDee. So she is responsible for Helter Skelter.

She stiffed a friend of mine whom she hired to write a treatment.

^ More details, please!

Come back r66 and spill!

She once got drunk, accidentally killed an ostrich and burned down a whorehouse in Montana in 1985.

Used to have sleepovers at Cleopatra's house.

Did she keep turning up to the Emmys all those times she lost?

Concerning the #MeToo movement she stated that too many ladies go about in various states of undress and seem to be willing - it did not go over well but she was too old to crucify so they basically ignored her.

Willing and waiting.

[quote]-one of her sons hung out with the Charles Manson cult before the murders

It was her daughter, DiDi. And the Family was more interested in having DiDi buy them things on Angela's credit cards than recruiting her. When Angela cut DiDi off, they stopped coming around.

Known to wear clown makeup, have Mexicans clean up her diahrrea after Taco Bell, and let Ed Asner do a dirty sanchez on her.

About twelve years ago, Manhattan Theatre Club somehow convinced her to do a table reading of a new play. The playwright was over the moon, as you can imagine. The day of the reading, she showed up, the actors all sat down and began reading. At the end of act one, she closed her script, politely thanked everyone, got up and left.

I don’t know if she hadn’t read the script beforehand or what. Or maybe there were rewrites she didn’t like. You can’t begrudge her not wanting to waste her time. Why should she? But my heart goes out to that poor playwright.

The thing that turns me off about Lansbury is that she's the FIRST person to sing her praises, sometimes literally. There's a fine line between confidence and conceit, and if you think she's perfection and can do no wrong, you haven't seen 'A Life at Stake' where she plays a...femme fatale(!!!)...in a production that makes any Ed Wood film look like a masterpiece.

And when you think about it, almost the entire 1950's was a drought for her. In fact, I doubt anyone would be talking about her now if she hadn't gotten Mame in 1966.

Not sure, I agree, R77. She's not falsely modest, no, but in interviews she also strikes me as a very down to earth and pragmatic person, even well into her 90s.

She told the Munchkins that Judy LIKED to be fingered.

She’s doing Broadway again. She’s also doing some women’s thing next month. She never stops working.

R80 - I think you're referring to a one night staged reading of as a benefit for Roundabout Theatre. I don't think she'll actually be playing Broadway again in a full run. She was just interviewed by the CBC from her home in LA (she sounded sharp, still), but admitted that in the last couple of years she's had to lead a more sedentary life and even commented that she'd walk more if she didn't live in a hilly neighborhood.

I saw her in her last stage role -- the N. American national tour of Blithe Spirit -- which she toured the country with after also playing Madame Arcati on Broadway and on the West End. The US/Canada tour was with most of her UK/West End cast and despite the cast being universally excellent, she absolutely stole the show and proved to have the sharpest comedic timing of everyone on that stage despite her being double and even triple the age of some of them.

This is the one...

(What's the "Women's Thing" R80 is referring to?)

I don’t think she’s doing Broadway again, r80. There was a point when it was announced that she would do a revival of The Chalk Garden, but then she decided against it. I did not think she still has the stamina for the nightly Broadway grind.

She was the cuntiest cut who ever cunted in The Shell Seekers!

[quote]She told the Munchkins that Judy LIKED to be fingered.

Which was so mean of her. She knew very well that Judy preferred being triple penetrated, NOT fingered.

She had a thing about hammocks.

Oopsy.

Although quite content with her Broadway and television careers, angie was pointedly bitter for years about not having had a bigger Hollywood film career she thought she deserved.

What a fukin dumbass

I was guesting on MURDER. I flubbed a line during my first take....

And Miss Lansbury bitch-slapped me across the set. Her wedding ring left a permanent scar on one cheek, and I never worked at CBS again. Not ever.

Ew, R89. Don't be an asshole.

The CBC host who was interviewing her introduced her to the song which referenced "Murder She Wrote" -- she didn't 'mistakenly' think the song was about her, Angela Lansbury.

And I was beautiful!

And that's a sign of insecurity R80.

Exactly R88. Plus during the first five years or so of Murder She Wrote, she used to bitch that she wasn't being allowed to fully use her acting skills because the show required so little effort.

This, from the third choice for the part.

Well to be fair, MSW didn't require much in the way of acting chops. The plots were so thin: see long lost friend. Someone gets murdered. Friend is accused; JW goes sleuthing and gets friend off.

Who were the other two contenders, R94?

She gives a great bj...even now

She was an old fag hag.

Angie should have won the Emmy for the TV version of Sweeney Todd. Her inferior co-star won instead.

She didn't win the Emmy for that televised Sweeney Todd???? I always assumed she did because she was utterly brilliant! The best Mrs Lovett ever--able to squeeze every bit of humor and pathos out of the script

I believe she's the Susan Lucci of primetime.

Although Lucci won eventually.

Deirdre, her daughter, was a Manson satellite. Not quite a Manson Girl, but close.

Jean Stapleton was the first choice for Jessica. According to this article, Angela Lansbury was second choice after Jean bailed.

Jean Stapleton would have been great too. Actually old female actress could have done a good job

Angela made MSW what it is. They did try a couple of times to push her for an Emmy (playing dual roles as her lookalike cockney cousin Emma and Jessica being told her husband had cheated on her). Alas, her competition always had lots of gripping drama where they could excel.

I saw her in 2014, Blithe Spirit and she was terrific. I met her briefly at the stage door and she was charming.

[quote]What's the "Women's Thing" [R80] is referring to?

It's called a vagina.

For the first time in ages, Angie doesn't have anything listed on IMDB. Her last gigs were MPR and something called "Buttons," both last year. Has she taken the year off, or is she finally packing it in a retiring for good from everything?

R106 - listen to her new CBC interview referenced up thread. She says she "doesn't make films anymore" -- whether that's an official retirement or just her pragmatism speaking, I don't know. I always wished she'd landed one last, juicy guest starring role on a prestige cable drama , like Lois Smith's wonderful guest performance on an episode of The Americans.

Angela is LUCKY she worked for as long as she did as a supporting actor, and got her own TV series late late late in life. Instead she bitches!

[quote]She says she "doesn't make films anymore"

Well if she doesn't make films anymore, and she doesn't do theater anymore, what the hell DOES she do? Sit on her lazy ass all day long and twiddle her thumbs?

She’s still doing theater.

She’s doing multiple events over the next couple of months including another stint on Broadway.

She's not really doing theatre. Her "another stint on Broadway" is playing Lady Bracknell in "Importance of Being Earnest" in a one-night charity event for Roundabout.

I too wish she had one last great movie role, a terrific TV movie and a final stint on Broadway.

When Tom Bosley use to flub lines she would loudly yell "Well Potsie fucked up again."

R95, R102. Yes, Stapleton, then Doris Day.

As always, Lansbury came in third.

[quote]then Doris Day.

Uh, no. The "Doris Day as a senior solving mysteries" thing came later, obviously inspired by Lansbury's success in Murder She Wrote. But she was not up for Murder She Wrote itself. That was only Stapleton who got the offer, and then they went straight to Lansbury when Stapleton passed.