La actriz Angela Lansbury, de 96 años, se casó con un hombre gay antes de encontrar a su verdadero amor

Dic 23, 2021

Angela Lansbury, de 96 años, es una actriz británica-estadounidense conocida por sus numerosos papeles en teatro, cine y televisión. Su carrera en el mundo del espectáculo ha durado casi 80 años y, de hecho, se la considera una de las últimas estrellas que quedan de la Edad de Oro de Hollywood.

Más conocida por sus papeles en "The Manchurian Candidate" ("El embajador del miedo"), "Mame", "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" ("Travesuras de una bruja") y "Murder, She Wrote" ("La reportera del crimen"), Lansbury también ha prestado su voz a populares películas animadas como "La bella y la bestia" y "Anastasia".

Ha recibido muchos premios a lo largo de su extensa carrera, incluido un Premio Honorífico de la Academia y un Premio a la Trayectoria de los BAFTA. También ha ganado unos increíbles cinco premios Tony, seis Globos de Oro y un premio Olivier, entre otras muchas nominaciones.

Pero además de su carrera estelar, Lansbury ha tenido una vida personal agitada. A los 19 años, Lansbury se casó con otro actor llamado Richard Cromwell, que entonces tenía 35 años. Menos de un año después, la pareja se divorció, pero no fue debido a su diferencia de edad. Aunque en su momento no se reveló el motivo de su ruptura, más tarde se supo que Cromwell era gay. No obstante, la pareja siguió siendo muy amiga hasta la muerte de él en 1960.

En 1949, cuando Lansbury tenía unos 24 años, se casó con el amor de su vida, Peter Shaw. La pareja tuvo dos hijos: Anthony y Deirdre. Su amor nunca decayó y la pareja permaneció unida hasta la muerte de Shaw en 2003, tras la cual Lansbury pasó por un periodo depresivo de luto.

Sigue leyendo para saber más sobre su vida amorosa a lo largo de los años.

Angela was born to an upper-middle-class family in central London on Oct. 16, 1925. Her mother was actress Moyna Macgill and her father was a timber merchant and politician named Edgar Lansbury. Angela’s father passed away from stomach cancer when she was 9 and the actress had said that playing characters helped her cope with her grief.

Her mother struggled financially, and when she became engaged to another man, Angela and her mother moved in with him in Hampstead. Angela continued to educate herself with the help of books, movies and the theater. The young girl also learned how to play the piano and studied music at the Ritman School of Dancing. In 1940, she studied acting at the Webber Douglas School of Singing and Dramatic Art.

With the onset of the London Blitz, Angela's mother decided to move her family to the United States in 1940. Once there, Angela earned a scholarship from the American Theatre Wing, which granted her access to study at the Feagin School of Dramatic Radio and Arts. After graduating from the school in March of 1942, her family once again moved, this time to Greenwich Village. 

A natural-born actor all of her life, Angela once said:

“I did want people to notice me as a child. At the age of 11 or 12, I remember sitting on buses and trying to look interesting. Or I would get people’s attention by saying something kind of outlandish that simply sounded as if I knew something they didn’t know.”

She added:

“I had no adolescence. And I was too busy preparing to become an actress. It never occurred to me not to go on, not for one second. Nor did I think I was missing anything.”  

Angela began her professional acting career at the young age of 17 when she went from working the cosmetic counter at a small department store to suddenly signing a contract with MGM Studios. MGM had been looking for young British actresses to fill their roster, and Angela fit the bill perfectly.

Shortly after she signed with MGM, she had her first major role in the 1944 movie "Gaslight," in which she starred alongside such Hollywood greats as Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer. Astoundingly, this first landmark role garnered the then-rookie actress an Oscar nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role and sent her career rocketing to the top seemingly overnight. 

Angela's first Oscar nod was followed very shortly thereafter by a second Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for the film "The Picture of Dorian Gray." However, during this time, most of her roles were supporting characters, as Angela was under contract with MGM, which made her steadily grow unsatisfied with the way she was cast. She voiced her unhappiness in a 2017 Vanity Fair interview where she said:

"I was a utility actress, as far as MGM was concerned. They could put me into almost any role, and I would act it." 

This often had the young actress playing the role of middle-aged women despite the fact that she was a good 20 years younger than the characters she represented. MGM's way of handling her left her feeling underappreciated and stifled in her career and skills. As she explained in the same interview: 

“MGM did not have a clue as to how to use me. And eventually, I couldn’t wait to leave because I wasn’t getting anywhere.”

She finally canceled her contract with MGM in 1952 and left acting for a while and instead chose to focus on her growing family.  

When she returned to acting, Angela's career continued to rise. However, once again she was typecast in roles as older women who were often villainous or antagonistic characters. She went so far as to complain that "Hollywood made me old before my time." During the '50s and '60s, she portrayed a number of middle-aged women, even though she was only in her 30s. 

In the 1961 movie “Blue Hawaii,” 36-year-old Angela portrayed the mother of Elvis Presley’s character Chad Gates, even though Presley was 26 at the time. The year after, she portrayed Laurence Harvey’s scary mother in “The Manchurian Candidate,” while Harvey was three years her junior. Nevertheless, the role landed Angela her third Academy Award nomination. 

Arguably her most famous character, however, is Jessica Fletcher, the author-turned-sleuth from the long-running television drama series “Murder, She Wrote.” The show debuted in 1984 and remained on the air until 1996. Angela's wit, warmth and integrity made the show a smash hit. Her turn in the series is widely considered to be her most popular, but this signature role of hers almost didn't happen, as she went against her agent's recommendations, who had instead favored the main role in a sitcom that she was offered at the same time.

But Angela went with the role she wanted to play the most, and aren't we all lucky she did! It brought her a great deal of recognition and cemented her icon status in the minds of a new generation of TV viewers while reviving interest among her longtime fans. Furthermore, she also received numerous award nominations for the role, including the Primetime Emmy Awards, Golden Globe Awards and SAG Awards.  

What's more, Angela took on the role in "Murder, She Wrote" in her 60s, an age many in Hollywood would consider past an actor's prime. Instead, it made her a powerhouse in the entertainment industry, and many touted her to be the most powerful woman on television at the time. She wished to make sure her character's personality remained strong, so Angela pushed for changes to the script if the character wasn't to the right standard. Several of Angela's family members, including her husband and son, also worked on the show. She would continue to play that part with her signature passion and charisma past her 70th birthday.    

During an interview with Studio 10 in Sept. 2018, Angela opened up about the iconic show and her role in reshaping Fletcher's character. While the writers originally wanted the character to be a bit sillier, Angela wanted to portray her as a smart woman who was more dynamic.

“By the time we were finished, she had gotten back her sense of purpose as a woman, she was attractive, she had boyfriends, she had a nice wardrobe,” Angela said. “She became much more of an ‘every woman’ rather than a kook.”

Then, towards the end of the century, Angela's career took yet another turn when in 1996 she managed to conquer Broadway when she played the titular character in the musical-comedy smash hit “Mame.” The list of her Broadway triumphs is long and varied. From Mama Rose in “Gypsy” to the murderous widow Mrs. Lovett in “Sweeney Todd,” Angela always gave her Broadway audiences something remarkably special. She has continued to remain faithful to the stage to this day, while she appeared in a London West End revival of “Blithe Spirit” in 2015.  

Forbes reported that the incredible actress was initially offered the role of Nurse Ratchet in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” in 1975, but she turned it down because she didn’t know if she would be able to handle it. Instead, Louise Fletcher was cast and went on to win the Oscar for Outstanding Actress in a Lead Role for her portrayal of the character. 

Nevertheless, the list of awards and nominations that Angela received over the course of her incredibly long career is nothing short of remarkable. In addition to her three Academy Award nominations, she also managed to earn seven Tony Award nominations, five of which she won. Even if an Oscar for a particular performance eluded her, she was finally given an honorary Academy Award in 2014. In addition, she earned an amazing 18 Emmy nominations and 15 Golden Globe nominations.

With such a long career behind her, it’s no surprise that Angela was one of the most awarded actresses of all time and was honored multiple times for her hard work and dedication to the entertainment industry. In 2010, Angela passed Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson and Alan Alda for the most Golden Globe Award wins. While each of the other actors has six wins, Angela won her seventh that year. She also received the John F. Kennedy Center Honors in 2000 for all of her incredible work and dedication to the arts.

Angela went above and beyond in her professional life multiple times, and she brought that same attitude toward more personal endeavors. The actress was a strong supporter of certain charities, including Abused Wives in Crisis, an organization that helps victims of domestic abuse, as well as a number of charities aimed at fighting against the HIV/AIDS epidemic. 

De niña, Lansbury estudió música antes de empezar a estudiar actuación en 1940 en la Academia de Arte Dramático Webber Douglas de Londres. Después de que su familia se trasladara a Estados Unidos durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial, la actriz en crecimiento se inició en Hollywood a los 17 años, cuando pasó de trabajar en el mostrador de cosméticos de una pequeña tienda por departamento a ser contratada por los estudios MGM. La MGM había estado buscando jóvenes actrices británicas para llenar su lista, y Lansbury encajaba perfectamente.

El éxito llegó rápidamente para Lansbury, que fue nominada a su primer Óscar por su primer papel importante en la película de 1944 " Gaslight" ("Luz de gas"). A esto le siguió, muy poco después, una segunda nominación al Óscar a la mejor actriz de reparto por " El retrato de Dorian Gray".

Mientras encontraba el éxito en Hollywood, Lansbury se casó con Cromwell, otro actor, en 1945, cuando ella tenía solo 19 años y él 35. Sin embargo, la relación no estaba destinada a ser y para 1946 se habían divorciado. La pareja no habló de los motivos por los que su unión no había funcionado en aquel momento, pero años después Lansbury reveló que el obstáculo no era solamente la diferencia de edad, sino el hecho de que Cromwell era gay. Lansbury declaró a Radio Times, según informa Attitude:

"No tenía ni idea de que me iba a casar con un hombre gay... Me pareció un individuo muy atractivo. Quería casarse, estaba fascinado conmigo, pero únicamente por lo que había visto en la pantalla".

Añadió

"No me perjudicó ni me dañó de ninguna manera, porque mantuvo una amistad conmigo y con mi futuro marido (Peter Shaw)... Nada más fue un terrible error que cometí siendo una mujer muy joven. Pero no me arrepiento".

Cromwell falleció de cáncer de hígado en 1960.

Sin embargo, Lansbury encontró el verdadero amor poco después con Shaw, un actor y productor con el que se casó en 1949. Su matrimonio con Shaw resultó ser el más importante. Shaw ya tenía un hijo de su primer matrimonio, David, y Lansbury lo acogió como propio. David dijo una vez:

"Es una gran dama. Entré en su vida y ella no tenía por qué aceptarme, pero lo hizo. Fue algo increíble. Siempre da prioridad a la familia".

Pero la pareja tenía planes para tener más hijos, así que en 1952 –más o menos cuando dejó MGM– Lansbury dio a luz a su hijo Anthony, mientras que un año después la pareja tuvo una hija llamada Deirdre. La familia de Lansbury siempre ha sido increíblemente valiosa para la estrella, e incluso cuando no trabajaba como actriz, sabía que sus hijos estaban en buenas manos con Shaw. Lansbury dijo en una entrevista de 2012:

"Le doy a Peter el mérito de muchas cosas que probablemente no habría hecho si me hubieran dejado a mi suerte. Él me decía: 'Ve a hacerlo; yo me ocuparé de las cosas aquí. Ve', y siempre le agradecí que lo hiciera".

Tan fuerte era el amor de la pareja que cuando Shaw murió en 2003, tras 53 años juntos, Lansbury se lo tomó muy mal. Dijo en la misma entrevista de 2012:

"No es el plan de vida que uno tiene. Y nunca se te ocurre hasta que de repente ocurre y esa persona especial se ha ido".

En una entrevista con CNN, Lansbury habló de la fase depresiva en la que entró tras la muerte de Shaw y de cómo no quería forzarse a seguir adelante antes de tiempo:

"Solo sabía que tenía que esperar, y que llegaría el momento en que tendría que volver a mirar a la superficie y encontrar la manera de reparar la grieta que había en mi alma".

¿Sabías de los dos matrimonios de Angela Lansbury, incluido el de su verdadero amor, Peter Shaw? Si te ha gustado leer esto, compártelo con tus conocidos para que también puedan leerlo.