Eventually, they moved to California, where Moyna hoped she and her daughter could break into movies. After a dangerous ship crossing, they made their way to New York. She sold everything, books, everything.” World War II had begun. “The business sort of fell off appreciably, and my mother found herself a widow with four children and her income was very much reduced. But her happy childhood was cut short at age 9 when her father died of cancer. Her father, Edgar Lansbury, a businessman. Her mother, Moyna Macgill, was a successful London actress. It was missing the night of the fire.” “Jessica Fletcher was probably about as close not to me, but to the sort of woman that I might have been had I not been an actress.” Angela Brigid Lansbury was born in London in 1925. “I am a character actress first and foremost, although the one area that I was not a character actress, really, was playing Jessica Fletcher.” “And the proof is right here. Her lasting popularity was a testament to the determination and talent of a woman whom Hollywood studios did not see as their leading lady. In between, Angela Lansbury’s career spanned seven decades and countless transformations on stage, screen and television.

See the way she looked at me?” She earned an Oscar nomination 19 and a Tony award at 83.

I was primarily an actress and not a pretty face.” “I’m not going to sleep in the same room with her.

“I can say this in all honesty, I was too good an actress. She spoke with us with the understanding the interview would be published only after her death. Transcript The Last Word: Angela Lansbury The New York Times sat down with Angela Lansbury in 2010 to discuss her life and accomplishments on the stage and screen.

His and her circumstances