One week ago, I wrote a tribute to the Queen of Country Music Loretta Lynn.
Tonight I am remembering the First Lady of stage and screen and 1980's-90's prime
time television detectives, Dame Angela Lansbury, who died today at the age of 96.
Jessica Fletcher on "Murder She Wrote"
Angela died peacefully at her home in Los Angeles, California surrounded by
her loving family. She was just five days from celebrating her 97th birthday.
Angela was predeceased by her husband, Peter Shaw.
Angela Lansbury was an award-winning Broadway actress who won five
Tony Awards and a lifetime achievement award. She also earned three Academy
Award nominations as supporting actress, first as the conniving young maid,
Nancy Oliver, in the 1944 psychological thriller, "Gaslight" (which was also her
first film role); then as the working class tavern singer Sibyl Vane,
in the supernatural mystery, "The Picture of Dorian Gray" (1945);
and later, as the sinister communist agent, Eleanor Iselin, mother of
the title character ( played by Lawrence Harvey) in the cold war
suspense drama, "The Manchurian Candidate" (1962).
Angela also played the big sister of Elizabeth Taylor in the
classic movie, "National Velvet" in 1944.
In one of my favorite movies, "The Harvey Girls" (1946) she played a
tough-talking saloon girl and rival of good girl Judy Garland.
Known for playing woman older than herself, Angela played
the mother of Elvis Presley in the 1961 movie, "Blue Hawaii"
She was only ten years older than the King of Rock 'n' Roll!
Despite her many varied roles as a film actress, Angela Lansbury
was destined to become the legendary toast of Broadway, beginning
in 1966, when she landed the title role in the hit musical, "Mame".
This was followed by the equally successful, "Dear World" (1969)
"Gypsy" (1975) and the diabolical, "Sweeney Todd" which
opened on Broadway in 1979, and in London's West End in 1980.
Angela is well known for her work on the English stage. Her first
London stage appearance in nearly 40 years began in March 2014
when she reprised her performance as Madame Arcati in Noel
Coward's "Blithe Spirit" at the Gielgud Theater in London's West End.
As recent as November, 2019 Angela made her final return to Broadway
as Lady Bracknell, in a one-night benefit staging of Oscar Wilde's
"The Importance of Being Earnest" for the Roundabout Theatre
Company's American Airlines Theatre.
But perhaps Angela's signature performance began in 1984, when she
was offered the role of Jessica Fletcher in a new TV crime drama called,
"Murder She Wrote". The part of Jessica Fletcher was originally
offered to actress Jean Stapleton. When she declined the role,
Angela was approached by the show's producers for the part
and she accepted! Sunday nights were never the same as
"Murder She Wrote" became part of CBS' prime time
line-up, premiering on September 30, 1984.
Loosely based on one of Britain's most famous female sleuths,
Agatha Christie's matronly Miss Marple, Angela embraced the role
of the middle-aged widowed English teacher Jessica Fletcher, a resident
of the idyllic Down East village of Cabot Cove on the Maine coast.
When well-meaning nephew, Grady, submits her mystery novel,
"The Corpse Danced At Midnight" to a New York publisher in the
show's two-part premiere episode, "The Murder of Sherlock Holmes"
Jessica finds herself propelled overnight into becoming a famous,
best-selling author. But when an unwanted guest is later
murdered at a costume party, Jessica begins to miss
her quiet life in Cabot Cove.
As the seasons progress, Jessica becomes involved more
actively in solving murders, some of which take place in
Cabot Cove, while others take place in ski country and
the Deep South, as well as the New Mexico desert
among other places across America, and later,
the action picks up overseas in Europe, the
Middle East, and Asia.
"Murder She Wrote" ran for 12 seasons, and included as recurring
cast members: actor Claude Akins as Jessica's commercial fisherman
neighbor, Captain Ethan Craig; Former "Happy Days" star Tom Bosley
as Cabot Cove Sheriff Amos Tupper, actor William Windom as the crusty
town doctor, Seth Hazlitt, actress Julie Adams as flirtatious real estate
agent Eve Simpson, and many others. Sheriff Amos Tupper was
later replaced with Sheriff Mort Metzger played by actor Ron Masak.
Many well-known celebrities made guest appearances on
"Murder She Wrote" including actor Hurd Hatfield, who starred in
the movie, "The Picture of Dorian Gray" with Angela; fellow Broadway
star Jerry Orbach, who played old school private investigator
Harry McGraw in several episodes, as well as another Broadway actor,
"Bluebloods" star Len Cariou, playing MI5 agent Michael Haggerty,
who had a knack for getting Jessica unwillingly mixed up
in plots of international intrigue.
Former General Hospital star Genie Francis guest starred as Jessica's
lovely if hapless niece, Victoria Griffin, married to her actor husband,
Howard (Jeff Conaway, Dean Butler); actor Michael Horton, who
played Jessica's nephew, Grady Fletcher, married his sweetheart,
Donna Mayberry in one episode, who was played by his
real-life wife, actress Debbie Zipp.
"Friends" Courtney Cox played Jessica's niece, Carol Bannister in
the two part third season episode, "Death Stalks The Big Top"
which also featured former child star, Jackie Cooper as
Jessica's presumed dead brother-in-law Neil Fletcher,
while Canadian actress Belinda J. Montgomery played
Jessica's tormented niece, Pamela Crane, in the first
season episode, "My Johnny Lies Over The Ocean".
And who could forget Jessica teaming up with handsome
Hawaii-based PI Thomas Magnum (Tom Selleck) in the two-part,
third season "cross-over" episode called "Magnum On Ice" when
Angela and Tom guest starred on each others' shows?
Thomas Magnum (Tom Selleck) in a scene from the Murder She Wrote episode,
(1986).
Later episodes of "Murder She Wrote" included several trips to solve
mysteries in beautiful Ireland, where Angela lived with her husband,
Peter and their children Anthony and Deidre in the early 1970's.
One of my favorite Emerald Isle episodes is Season 12th's
two part, "Nan's Ghost" in which Jessica solves the mystery
surrounding the strange death of a young Irish woman
who had been searching for Cromwell's hidden treasure.
Although the show ended in May, 1996 there are four post-Murder
movies: "South By Southwest" (1997) "A Story To Die For" (2000)
"The Last Free Man" (2001) and "The Celtic Riddle" (2003),
which finds Jessica once again traveling to Ireland to
solve another mystery surrounding a secret treasure.
Some of my favorite Angela Lansbury movies include Disney's
"Bedknobs and Broomsticks"(1971); "The Company of Wolves" (1984);
"The Shell Seekers" (1989) "Mrs. Arris Goes To Paris" (1992).
And I just loved her as the voice of the charming "Mrs. Potts"
in the animated Disney fairy tale, "Beauty and The Beast" (1991).
Beauty and The Beast
Disney Lyrics
Dame Angela Brigid Lansbury, gifted actress and singer
and a very special lady. May she rest in eternal peace.
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