Angela Lansbury was presented with an honorary degree by Jon Westling (Hon.’03), then BU president ad interim, at the University’s May 20,1990, Commencement. Photo by Kalman Zabarsky

Film & TV

Angela Lansbury’s Surprising Boston University Ties

The award-winning actor, who died this week at 96, had some little-known Comm Ave connections

Angela Lansbury, who along with enjoying an illustrious film and stage career also became America’s most surprising and colorful TV detective, Jessica Fletcher, in the long-running hit TV series Murder, She Wrote, died this week at 96. Little known about her background, however, are her numerous Boston University connections. 

Few actors had as successful or as long a career. Born in England, Lansbury moved to Hollywood as a teenager, earning an Oscar nomination at just 18 for her first film role, in Gaslight in 1944. She earned two additional Oscar nominations, for 1945’s The Picture of Dorian Gray and 1962’s The Manchurian Candidate and was awarded an honorary Oscar for her film work in 2013. On stage, she won five Tony Awards, for performances in Mame, Dear World, Gypsy, Sweeney Todd, and Blithe Spirit, and this past spring was given a Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. She was also known for her work as Mrs. Potts in the animated Beauty and the Beast, and in one of her final film appearances, as the Balloon Lady in 2018’s Mary Poppins Returns.

Lansbury’s ties to Boston University span decades. In 1990, she received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from BU, her first college degree. “I never went to college,” she said at the ceremony. “I left school at 12 for acting classes, and I’ve been in the theater ever since.” That visit would not be her only one to BU.

In 2003, she visited campus for the renaming of the University’s Special Collections as the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center (HGARC), named for longtime center director Gotlieb. Following Gotlieb’s death in 2005, she returned to speak at his memorial service at Marsh Chapel. And she visited again in 2011, taking the podium to speak at the opening of an exhibition of the Ginger Rogers collection at HGARC. But perhaps Lansbury’s closest ties to BU can be found in the HGARC archives. Through her close friendship with Gotlieb, she donated many of her papers and memorabilia to the center, starting in 1981. 

“Angela Lansbury was an extraordinary talent, whose fame never distracted or detracted from her highest priority, her family,” Sean Noel, HGARC associate director, said this week after her death. “She was a star on stage, on the screen, on the television; and yet, she was every bit as kind and lovely in person as you would have dreamed—and hoped—she would be.”

HGARC Angela Lansbury Collection 

For those interested in learning more about Lansbury’s career, the collection is a treasure trove of manuscripts, correspondence, photographs, printed material, personal memorabilia, professional material, audio recordings, video recordings, and other items, ranging from 1944 to 2015, some on display in a case on Mugar Memorial Library’s first floor. (Researchers can make an appointment to see additional parts of the collection by emailing archives@bu.edu.)

Manuscripts in the collection consist primarily of scripts and screenplays for stage plays, musicals, and films she appeared in. There are one or more drafts of most scripts, along with relevant programs, printed reviews, publicity items, photographs, correspondence, financial records, or other documents (type and amount of records vary with each). Play and musical titles include All Over, by Edward Albee (Hon.’10) (1970-1972); Gypsy, by Arthur Laurents, Stephen Sondheim, and Jule Styne (1973-1975); Hamlet, by William Shakespeare (1975); The King and I, by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II (1978); Mame, by Jerome Lawrence, Robert E. Lee, and Jerry Herman (1966-1976); Prettybelle, by Bob Merrill and Jule Styne (1971); Sondheim: A Musical Tribute (1973); and Sweeney Todd (1979). Films include The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (1965); Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971); Death on the Nile (1978); The Harvey Girls (1946); In the Cool of the Day (1962); The Mirror Crack’d (1980); The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945); The Private Affairs of Bel Ami (1947); The Red Danube (1948); The Reluctant Debutante (1958); Something for Everyone (1970); Woman Without a Face (1966); A Little Night Music (2009); Deuce (2007); Driving Miss Daisy (2013); All About Eve; Beauty and the Beast; The Blackwater Lightship; Lettuce and Lovage; Nanny McPhee; The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax; A Green Journey; Mrs. Arris Goes to Paris; The Shell Seekers; The Visit; and an episode of the series Murder, She Wrote. There is also a draft of a speech Lansbury gave at the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center in 2003.

Correspondence in the collection dates from 1970 to 2015, and includes both personal and professional correspondence. Among notable correspondents are Edward Albee, Julie Andrews, Bea Arthur, Alec Baldwin, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Joan Crawford, Al Gore, Katharine Hepburn, Bob Hope, Harold Prince, Nancy Reagan, Rex Reed, Elizabeth Taylor, Barbara Walters, and various well-known actors, writers, directors, and producers.

Photographs in the collection date from 1924 to 2010. The earlier photos include several images of Lansbury as a child with her family. In other images, Lansbury is performing on stage, backstage at various performances, at home, and with various other individuals. Images of notable individuals include Bill and Hillary Clinton, Walter Cronkite, Lauren Bacall, Stephen Sondheim, Victor Garber, Harold Prince, John Frankenheimer, and others.

The collection’s printed material includes newspaper clippings, magazines, and other items regarding Lansbury and her family, as well as articles and reviews about her performances; these items date from 1944 to 2014. Among other printed items are invitations, programs, and publicity from various lectures, dinner engagements, and other public appearances by Lansbury. The sheet music includes music for Sweeney Todd, The Visit, Gypsy, and Prettybelle.

In the collection’s memorabilia are Lansbury’s Academy Award nominations for best supporting actress for Gaslight, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and The Manchurian Candidate. Also in the collection is Lansbury’s certificate of nomination for best actress in a musical or comedy from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, for Something for Everyone.