Landsbury, Angela, 1925-2022

Dame Angela Brigid Lansbury DBE (born October 16, 1925, London, England – died October 11, 2022, Los Angeles, California), Irish-British-American actress and singer who played various roles across film, stage and television. Her career, much of it in the United States, spanned eight decades, and her work received much international attention. She was one of the last surviving stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood cinema at the time of her death. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including six Tony Awards (including Lifetime Achievement Award), six Golden Globe Awards, a Laurence Olivier Award and the Academy Honorary Award, in addition to nominations for three Academy Awards, eighteen Primetime Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award. Lansbury was born to an upper-middle-class family in Central London, the daughter of Irish actress Moyna Macgill and English politician Edgar Lansbury. To escape the Blitz, she moved to the United States in 1940, studying acting in New York City. Proceeding to Hollywood in 1942, she signed to MGM and obtained her first film roles, in Gaslight (1944), National Velvet (1944), and The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), earning her two Academy Award nominations and a Golden Globe Award. She appeared in eleven further MGM films, mostly in minor roles, and after her contract ended in 1952 she began supplementing her cinematic work with theatrical appearances. Although largely seen as a B-list star during this period, her role in the film The Manchurian Candidate (1962) received widespread acclaim and is often cited as one of her career-best performances, earning her a third Academy Award nomination. Moving into musical theatre, Lansbury finally gained stardom for playing the leading role in the Broadway musical Mame (1966), which won her her first Tony Award and established her as a gay icon.