Why was Angela Lansbury never in Harry Potter?

She wasn’t tall enough!

She's not a very good actress. That may have something to do with it.

Because he had a no-pegging policy!

They should have cast her and fellow Dame Olivia de Havilland.

Because of J.K.Rowlings Anti Trans issues, Angela knew early in before most people and found it deplorable.

Because Harry Potter doesn’t live in Cabot Cove

Clearly Angela wasn't British enough for a Harry Potter production.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks is Potter adjacent, but full of song and merriment, unlike the dour, bleak, repetitive world of Hogwarts.

What role would she have played? Maggie Smith got the only part Angela could have performed in. There were no other parts for older women.

She died years before they made the first movie.

She's not cutesy-Englishy enough.

Is Angela Lansbury even British anymore? After the outbreak of WWII when she was 15 or so, her family moved to the U.S, and has resided there ever since, save for when she relocated her own family to Ireland in the '60s for a brief period.

Why was I never in Harry Potter?

[quote]Why was I never in Harry Potter?

Because Hogwarts didn't need a whore.

Hahaha, R5, you mean the Angela Lansbury who gave her kid a permission slip so she could hang out with Charles Manson?

I thought Dame Angela would have been terrific as the Dowager Countess role on Downtown Abbey (sic). She can play haughty and deliver a zinger as well as beloved Dame Maggie and she could have finally won that long-overdue Emmy!

R14 What about me?

Because Hogwarts doesn't go for booze and dope!

She was supposed to be in Gandhi but she didn't want to shave her head.

Here's a fun thread about what other roles Angela could have done in her storied career..

Homophobic misogynist alert at r5.

I guess because she's not really part of the British acting scene, OP.

She's not photogenic.

R5 is concerned about imaginary trans violence but thinks cruelty to animals is funny. Hmmmmmm.

Dame Ange should have won that Oscar and at least 3 Emmys. Shame on them.

She almost was, but she slapped J.K. Rowling for asking "What is Bedknobs and Broomsticks?" when they met at a benefit gala.

R9 Madame Hooch? Professor Trelawney? Molly Weasley? Petunia Dursley? Dolores Umbridge?

She was in her late eighties at the time of the movies. Are many of the characters that old?

She could have been a gender-fluid Dumbledore.

I think she could have played Petunia Dursley or Dolores Umbridge R27.

Madame Hooch was a bit part. I don't think she could have played "crazy" like Thompson did for Trelawney.

For Molly ... I don't know what it is (I have nothing against Angela Lansbury), but "motherly" is not the first thing that comes to mind when I think of her past roles. I just don't think I would have bought it.

I meant late seventies and eighties. My portable keyboard cuts things out sometimes.

R22 That might be true although it didn't stop her from being in Nanny McPhee

R12 I thought she gave up her UK Citizenship but she became a Dame after all so I guess not. I had always been under the impression she couldn't become a Dame since she wasn't a British citizen anymore.

R30 You should watch her as Salome in Death on the Nile. She could have played crazy or eccentric at least.

The Madame Hooch etc roles are middle-aged women, not elderly ones.

She could have played the elderly lady historian who knew Dumbledore growing up and spills the beans to Harry about his backstory in the last book, the Weasley’s mean Auntie Muriel, the nurse in the hospital wing that’s always fixing Harry’s broken bones, or the portrait of Sirius Black’s mother that’s always yelling bigoted things at the children.

She could also have played Madame Pomfrey

She actually would have been perfect as Neville’s tough grandma who wears the big hat with the bird on it.

So what, r32? Just because she appears in one particular film, doesn't mean she should appear in certain others.

[quote]She was supposed to be in Gandhi but she didn't want to shave her head.

Now, why didn’t I think of that?

Oh yes it did, R14, desperately.

They should just do a trans Harry Potter series with all trans actors.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

R42

I'm always coming up with great ideas!

I would have preferred Angela on Downton Abbey over Shirley MacLaine who was so bland yet thought she was grand. Angela can come off as American, so she would have been better in that part. That being said, I wish they had cash Sian Phillips on Downton Abbey. A great reunions for her and Maggie Smith from Clash of the Titans.

[Quote]Is Angela Lansbury even British anymore?

Can she even do an authentic English accent anymore? I know her English accent(s) sound good enough for most American ears, but are the natives convinced?

Easy answer: Angela Lansbury isn’t considered a Brit.

Rowling refused to create a character of a country doctor named Seth Hazlitt as Lansbury's sidekick.

Seth was a Jack of all trades. GP, Surgeon, Coroner, expert on the Civil War and archaeologist!

R45 I've heard Brits complain that Angela can't pull off a convincing British accent anymore and that she is too Americanized.