Angela Lansbury Happy to Be Back on the Boards of Broadway

[Zoneboy]

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Angela Lansbury can tell you exactly how many corpses -- 264 -- she encountered as mystery writer and meddlesome amateur sleuth Jessica Fletcher on the hit CBS series "Murder, She Wrote."

But these days, Ms. Lansbury isn't examining the dead; she's summoning the dead as dotty spiritualist Madame Arcati in the Broadway revival of Noel Coward's 1941 comedy "Blithe Spirit." With her earnest evocation of British can-do fervor and her mad flits about the stage dancing a serpentine shag that outdoes Duse, she's a medium rare.


Ken Fallin"To have this opportunity at my time of life and career, it was too good to pass up," said Ms. Lansbury, 83. "Having done the other roles I have -- let's say it was a natural for me." Those other roles: eccentric novelist Salome Otterbourne in the 1978 feature "Death on the Nile" and eccentric detective Jane Marple in the 1980 movie "The Mirror Crack'd," both based on Agatha Christie novels, and of course busybody Jessica.

"This wasn't something I was waiting for," Ms. Lansbury continued, setting out a tea tray for a visitor at her midtown apartment. "It had never occurred to me. But when the subject came up I thought I should do it while I still could put one foot in front of the other. I often say to myself: 'What is it that you enjoy about playing these extraordinarily outré ladies who are way out?' And I think it's because I'm so far in. It's a curious desire on my part to let it rip. As an individual I find it difficult. It's part of being British."

When it comes to playing "way out ladies," Ms. Lansbury has been letting it rip for close to 50 years -- notably as the scheming, scary mother-knows-best, Eleanor Iselin, in the 1962 movie "The Manchurian Candidate," and as the demon barber's slatternly pie-baking accomplice, Mrs. Lovett, in the 1979 Broadway musical "Sweeney Todd."

But Ms. Lansbury had her limits. She drew the line at the sadistic Nurse Ratched in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," a part she says she was offered and that subsequently won an Oscar for Louise Fletcher. "I could not bring myself to play that role," she said. "'Manchurian Candidate' was a different quantity, let's face it. I wasn't drilling holes in people's skulls."

Everything but.

"Well, you never saw me do it," a laughing Ms. Lansbury countered.

Those who view success as quantifiable will, perhaps, be interested to learn that Ms. Lansbury has been nominated for three Oscars, five Tonys (she won for "Mame," "Dear World" "Gypsy" and "Sweeney Todd"), 18 Emmys (so far no victories in that column) and 15 Golden Globes (she's won six). The actress chooses the word "odd" to characterize her career. "You can't compartmentalize it," she said, pointing to a body of work spread over legit theater, musical theater, film and television, a medium she'd long avoided but that, in the form of "Murder, She Wrote" -- it ran from 1984 to 1996 -- provided her with financial stability and broad recognition, both previously elusive commodities.


"It was a calculated decision," Ms. Lansbury said. "I was sick of touring. I could go out in shows. I could do musicals until I was blue in the face. But I needed to have some security for later years. And 'Murder, She Wrote' put me right out there with the public all over the world. It made me feel terrific. It does to this day." One of the series' more ardent fans was Frank Sinatra, her "Manchurian Candidate" co-star. "He loved it. I thought that was so funny," Ms. Lansbury said. "He and his wife invited my husband and me to his house in Palm Springs for dinner because he wanted to talk about old times and 'Murder, She Wrote.'"

Ms. Lansbury insists that she isn't one for chewing on old bones. "I've always been a great believer in now," she said. "Living now, not in the future, not in the past." So never mind that for years she didn't get to act her age. She was only three years older than Laurence Harvey, who played her son in "Manchurian Candidate"; nine years older than Elvis Presley, who played her son in "Blue Hawaii." Never mind that the Hollywood panjandrums didn't know "what the hell to do with me," and that they took next to no notice of her success in "Murder, She Wrote." (But Ms. Lansbury admits that she's never forgiven Warner Brothers for casting Lucille Ball in the film version of "Mame.")

After her husband of 53 years, producer Peter Shaw, died six years ago, Ms. Lansbury couldn't imagine pulling up stakes and returning to the Broadway theater. "But I decided otherwise," she said. "I was in California, a place that Peter and I were never comfortable in after the '70s. And I thought to myself: 'My kids are grown. They've got their families. We all adore each other but I've got to pick up my bits and pieces and move in a direction that will give them a release from worrying about Mum.' And so I thought: 'Where was I happy with Peter?' It was New York. Our ties to the theater were so wonderful and so strong and I wanted to get back into doing creative new work, something I hadn't really had the opportunity to do for a number of years."

That opportunity came when Ms. Lansbury was recruited to star with Marian Seldes in the Terrence McNally play "Deuce," which had a brief run 2007. "And then along came Arcati and here I am again," she said with a smile.

Of course, it's one thing to get the part, quite another to play it eight times a week. "You say: 'Why are you doing this? Why are you putting yourself through this?'" said Ms. Lansbury, who is committed to "Blithe Spirit" until mid-July. "I know I'll get into the swing of it soon, and I'll get used to it and not be so worried about every single performance as though it were the first and the last. Also, worrying about my own strength and my ability to hold up and not let the side down."

Ms. Lansbury, who describes herself as a homebody and a working actress, is described by pretty much everyone else as a "living legend," a phrase that makes her want to vomit "a little," she conceded.

There comes a point with performers of a certain age, living legends or otherwise, when audiences begin to think it's not that they do it well, it's that they do it at all. "God help you when you get to that age," Ms. Lansbury said, "when you have no business treading the boards anymore."

But so far so good. Eight times a week, hand-stinging applause greets her entrance at the Shubert Theatre. "Obviously, that kind of reception lifts you and carries you because you know the audience has come because they want to see you," Ms. Lansbury said. "And I think: 'Damn it, girl. You'd miss it if you didn't have it.'"

[ClassicTVGal]

Thanks for the interview!

[coffield3]

Thank-You.