Angela Lansbury, Beloved Tony-Winning Star of Mame & Sweeney Todd, Dies at 96

Angela Lansbury, the award-winning stage and screen actress who rose to stardom in Sweeney Todd and Murder, She Wrote, died at home in Los Angeles on October 11. She was 96.

The Lansbury family announced the news today saying, "The children of Dame Angela Lansbury are sad to announce that their mother died peacefully in her sleep at home in Los Angeles at 1:30AM today, Tuesday, October 11, 2022, just five days shy of her 97th birthday. In addition to her three children, Anthony, Deirdre and David, she is survived by three grandchildren, Peter, Katherine and Ian, plus five great grandchildren and her brother, producer Edgar Lansbury. She was proceeded in death by her husband of 53 years, Peter Shaw. A private family ceremony will be held at a date to be determined.”  

Angela Brigid Lansbury was born to Irish actress Moyna Macgill and English politician Edgar Lansbury on October 16, 1925 in Regents Park, Central London. She moved to New York City in 1940 with her mother and two brothers and began studying acting.

Lansbury's Broadway career began with a role in Hotel Paradiso (1957), which she followed up with A Taste of Honey (1960). Lansbury's first Broadway collaboration with iconic composer Stephen Sondheim was in the short-lived musical Anyone Can Whistle (1964), in which Lansbury took on the comic role of "Mayoress" Cora Hoover Hooper. It didn't take long for Lansbury to land another starring Broadway role when she was cast in the title role of Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee and Jerry Herman's musical Mame (1966). The show netted Lansbury her first Tony Award win for Leading Actress in a Musical.

Next on Lansbury's Broadway docket was the role of Countess Aurelia in Dear World (1968)—a new musical also by Laurence, Lee and Herman—and a turn as Rose in the first revival of Arthur Laurents, Jule Styne and Sondheim's Gypsy. The musicals earned Lansbury her second and third Leading Actress Tony Awards. Shortly after, Lansbury originated the role of Mrs. Lovett in Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's Sweeney Todd (1970), winning her a fourth Tony Award for Leading Actress in a Musical.

Lansbury saw great success in numerous television and film roles, dating back to Gaslight (1944), which marked the first of her three Academy Award nominations. Her turn in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) netted Lansbury her second Oscar nod and the first of six Golden Globe Award wins. Years later, Lansbury earned the Globe and an Oscar nod for The Manchurian Candidate (1962). She was also Golden Globe-nominated for Something for Everyone (1970), Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971) and The Gift of Love: A Christmas Story (1983).

Lansbury's most enduring screen role came in that of famed mystery writer Jessica Fletcher in the TV series Murder, She Wrote (1984-1996). The role won Lansbury four Golden Globe Awards and 12 Emmy nominations. Lansbury's career also included Emmy-nominated turns for a PBS airing of Broadway's Sweeney Todd (1982), Little Gloria... Happy at Last (1982), hosting gigs at the 41st and 43rd Annual Tony Awards (1987 and 1989), The Blackwater Lightship (2004) and a pair of Law & Order episodes (2005). In 2014, Lansbury was presented with an honorary Academy Award for her screen work.

In 2007, following a quarter-century Broadway absence, Lansbury returned to the Great White Way in Terrence McNally's two-hander Deuce (2007). Lansbury earned her fifth Tony nomination for her performance as tennis player Leona Mullen. Lansbury next took on the role of the eclectic Madame Arcati in a Broadway revival of Noël Coward's Blithe Spirit (2009), winning her fifth Tony Award. She later reprised her performance on the revival's national tour. Lansbury earned a Tony nomination as matriarch Madame Armfeldt in a new production of Sondheim and Wheeler's A Little Night Music (2009). Her final Broadway appearance was as Sue-Ellen Gamadge in a revival of Gore Vidal's The Best Man (2012). She earned a Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achivement in 2022.

Lansbury was married to actor Richard Cromwell from 1945-1946. In 1949 she married actor and producer Peter Shaw, who died in 2003. Lansbury is survived by her children Anthony, Deirdre and David, three grandchildren, five great grandchildren and her brother, producer Edgar Lansbury.