Thank you, Angela Lansbury

When someone has been around and a part of your life for as long as Angela Lansbury was, it is inevitable to feel a sense of sadness and profound sense of loss, even though she lived to be a few days shy of her 97th birthday. By any measure that’s a good, solid run. Nonetheless, I shed a few tears when I heard about her passing today.

The day I saw Lansbury in Sweeney Todd was a day I discovered my form of religion – the music and words of Stephen Sondheim.

My Aunt Ruth and I started going to musicals together in 1977. When Sweeney Todd was announced as part of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera season for 1981, I got us tickets. I was thrilled by what I experienced on stage. My aunt wanted to leave. I went to the box office to purchase tickets to see it a second time.

That second performance proved to be the last performance of the US tour and Angela Lansbury’s last performance as Mrs. Lovett – the fiendishly plotting baker who’s passion for the demon barber of Fleet Street lead them both down very dark paths.

In 2014 when Lansbury came to Los Angeles with the production of Blithe Spirit that earned her a fifth Tony Award, I had a chance to speak with this legendary actress. I knew then this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. So in addition to asking her about Noël Coward’s play, I had to ask her about something that happened at that final Sweeney Todd performance.

As a practical joke played on Lansbury and George Hearn (who played the title character), someone in the crew put an enormous amount of flour inside the dough Mrs. Lovett kneads and pounds during A Little Priest. The flour when flying all over Lansbury and Hearn. They broke character so openly and for so long that the orchestra had to vamp while they regained their composure.

Apropos of something Jessica Fletcher might have asked, I simply said to her, “Whodunit? Did you ever figure it out?”

“Absolutely not. We did not. We were shocked,” she said. “It was funny. We knew it was our last show. We taped the show. We knew it was in the can, as they say, which was a vast relief and a great pleasure knowing it would be seen again. At the time it really was a shocker. Yes of course we were all covered in flour – at least I was. I never stopped fiddling around with dough. That’s part of the training of the job to deal with the dough. It was real dough. It wasn’t make believe. It’s lovely. Laughter in the theatre is one of the great tonics for actors and certainly Mrs. Lovett was a funny character and I got a tremendous response playing that role which was really quite wonderful.”

Over the years I had the privilege of seeing her in A Little Night Music on Broadway, Oscar and the Pink Lady at the Geffen Playhouse, in a tribute to Stephen Sondheim at the Hollywood Bowl. (If you want to hear 17,500 people gasp all at once, ask anyone who saw Lansbury get tripped up by a cable while making her way on stage to perform!)

There was also the time when Sondheim and Frank Rich had an on-stage discussion at UCLA’s Royce Hall. Lansbury and I were both trying to get backstage to greet Sondheim after it was ove. Neither of us was on the guest list and both thought we would be. The young man given the power of guardian of the door had no idea who Angela Lansbury was.

I politely told him about the many shows of Sondheim’s that she had been in (Anyone Can Whistle, Gypsy, Sweeney Todd and A Little Night Music.) He finally relented and allowed her to go backstage.

While I didn’t get let in that night, I will always have the memory of helping the woman who cemented – in no uncertain terms – my passion for all things Sondheim get an opportunity to see him.

During our interview I asked Lansbury if she ever imagined she’d end up with the career she did – particularly when the studio she was under contract to, MGM, was putting her in mostly matronly roles.

“I didn’t have a clue at that time. In fact, I was at a very low ebb in my self-esteem. I can assure you by the time I left Hollywood, except for The Manchurian Candidate and the first three movies, I had no reputation except as an also-ran. It was very discouraging. I knew that my future was probably in the theater and I had to pack up and go back to Broadway. That was a great decision I made, thank God.”

Thank you, Angela Lansbury for all the many hours of joy you gave us all – whether on stage or the twelve seasons you entertained us in Murder, She Wrote. Always had a fondness for you, I did.

Photo: Angela Lansbury in Sweeney Todd (Photo by Martha Swope/Courtesy New York Public Library Archive)