Editor’s Note: Holly Thomas is a writer and editor based in London. She is morning editor at Katie Couric Media. She tweets @HolstaT. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author. View more opinion on CNN.
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Her story began like a classic Hollywood fairytale, but that’s not how it ended. Angela Lansbury, who died on Tuesday aged 96, starred in her first film, “Gaslight,” in 1944 at just 19 years old. She’d been signed by MGM Studios just two years previously, having studied acting in New York City after her family, which had fallen on hard times, was forced to flee their home in Blitz-stricken London.
Like Ingrid Bergman who starred alongside her, Lansbury was nominated for an Oscar for her role in “Gaslight,” but unlike her luminous colleague, she did not win. Her loss that night was the first of a career marked by stunning performances that consistently won her critical acclaim, but rarely saw her cast as the leading lady. She later said that “earning an Academy Award too early is a terrible deterrent because you don’t know what to do next.”
What Lansbury did was forge a path through the next seven decades that looked nothing like that of her golden-age contemporaries. Her unfashionable evolution from Los Angeles to Broadway to television meant that her legacy was never tied to one period or genre in particular. An industry misfit, she was forced to transform the less sexy, less obvious roles she was often offered into gems that ensured she was constantly introduced to new generations with a fresh image. Ultimately, they showcased a self-confidence and sprawling talent that sealed her place as an all-time Hollywood icon.
Like many people my age, my first introduction to Angela Lansbury was as the voice of Mrs. Potts in Disney’s 1991 animated smash hit “Beauty and the Beast.” Being as superficial as most pre-pubescents, my main focus was on the leads, Belle, and the intriguing horned monster of a Beast who later turns into an underwhelming prince.
Nevertheless, the bit of the movie that relayed in my head for days after I watched it was always the title song, “Beauty and the Beast,” performed by Mrs. Potts. Lansbury sang it in one take, having not slept, just hours after getting off a plane that’d been held up by a bomb scare. She later explained the feat away as the product of an adrenaline high, saying: “I think it was the excitement of it all, the sense of ‘do it now!’”
It’s no wonder she nailed it, though. After movie offers dried up in the mid-1960s, Lansbury, then in her 40s, moved to Broadway. Her starring role in “Mame” in 1966 earned her a Tony award – the first of five, plus one for lifetime achievement – and established her as one of the first ladies of musical theater.
Cruelly, despite being a proven hit with audiences, Lansbury was replaced by Lucille Ball in “Mame“‘s 1974 movie adaptation. Lansbury later called the decision as a “big, dashing hopes disappointment.” Jerry Herman, who wrote the show’s music and lyrics, attributed the film’s dire commercial run to Hollywood’s tendency to pick actors who they think will be “a big box office star,” and disregard “whether the person’s right for the role.”
As Lansbury herself noted, Hollywood never seemed quite sure how to use her. Even in her 20s, she was often cast as a scheming, villainous matriarch. When she was just 35, she played a 26-year-old Elvis Presley’s idiotic mother in 1961’s “Blue Hawaii.” In 1962, she was Oscar-nominated for the third time for her chilling turn as the mother of a brainwashed son in “The Manchurian Candidate.” Laurence Harvey,…
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