Daily Lansbury

Here is a little comment by film critic Emmanuel Levy about Angela Lansbury in her first film, Gaslight. I've linked to it and I'm also going to just copy it. One of my other all time favorite actresses is Katherine Hepburn, so it is cool to see them compared.

Gaslight: How Cukor Discovered Angela Lansbury

George Cukor's casting coup was the hiring of a young British girl, Angela Lansbury, for the important role of Nancy, the conniving maid who attempts to lure Anton away from his wife. Looking for a girl to play the sluttish maid, Cukor knew one thing: she had to be English. Writer Van Druten told Cukor of a British actress, Magna Margia, who was in town with her daughter Angela and her two sons. The entire family was working at Bullock's in the Christmas rush.

Cukor asked Lansbury to a test, which went excellently. The young actress had the right poise and her Cockney accent was authentic. But she was too young and didn't seem sexy enough. Overweight and spotty, Lansbury looked like a department-store salesgirl. "I don't think you're going to get the job," Cukor told her, "but I think you're a very talented girl." Lansbury went back to Bullock's with a mixed reaction of dejection and encouragement.

However, a week later, Cukor looked at Lansbury' test again, and called her in for a second audition. It turned out to be even better than the first. In the end, Cukor liked her so much that he had her role rewritten and expanded. When Lansbury told her Bullock's manager that she had found a better job, he proposed to raise her pay to 27 dollars a week. He was shocked when she said that Mr. Cukor at MGM had signed her for a seven-year-contract at 500 dollars a week!

There were some unanticipated problems with Lansbury, however. At 5'8", she was the same height as Bergman. To add to her height, so as to contribute to the suspense of the scene in which she threatens Paula, Cukor made her wear platform shoes. "They thought my towering over Ingrid would make me more sinister," recalled Lansbury. Another unexpected problem was a scene in which she lights a cigarette, in defiance of her mistress. This scene was postponed for several weeks, because Lansbury was only 17, and the studio's teacher would not allow her to smoke until she was 18. When this eagerly-awaited day arrived, Cukor and Bergman threw a surprise party for her on the set.

Cukor later said that, aside from Katharine Hepburn, Lansbury was the only other actress who took to film so quickly. An ordinary-looking girl, when the audience saw Lansbury for the first time, all the character was right in her face; she became the character by just drooping her mouth. "Even though Gaslight was her first picture," Cukor said, "she had the ability to transform herself into the character she was playing as soon as the cameras turned." "Some people have experience, but still remain eternal amateurs," Cukor elaborated, "but Angela was a pro from the very first day."

Lansbury's stunning debut in Gaslight certified her talent and honored her, at the age of l8, with the first of three Oscar nominations. "I was really very young," recalled Lansbury in an l978 tribute to Cukor, "and I didn't know my ass from a hole in the ground. He introduced me to style."

A huge box office hit, Gaslight was nominated for eight Oscar Awards, including Best Picture, though Cukor failed again to receive a directorial nomination. At Oscar time, the movie won two Oscars: Best Actress for Bergman and art direction for Cedric Gibbons.