Memories of a consummate actress

In the weeks since the passing of Angela Lansbury, a doting media has showered her with fond farewell tributes, all richly deserved. I don’t know another performer who has given me so much pleasure, so often, and for so long. I took every opportunity to see her here and in New York. She never disappointed.

She had it all and she had it right from the beginning. Her first two films demonstrated a range beyond the scope of many more experienced actresses. The saucy, cruel, libidinous maid in Gaslight was followed by perhaps the purest study of innocence and vulnerability on film. The heartbreaking betrayal of Sybil Vane in The Picture of Dorian Gray makes me want to thrash Mr. Gray each time I watch Lansbury singing about that yellow bird.

The first time I saw her onscreen was as the brassy dance hall floozy giving Judy Garland a hard time in The Harvey Girls. A few years later, it was as the lovely Semador in Samson and Delilah. My twelve year old self was traumatized when she got speared during the wedding brawl. I always needed her to stick around to the end of the movie. She was such good company.

Her face was an instrument of subtle shading, and her bag of tricks was inexhaustible. You always knew what she was thinking. This was a face that could comfort, seduce, or frighten the bejeezus out of you. Hollywood didn’t know what to do with her. She had the beauty and glamour of a star, but the instincts of a character actress.

She, however, did know what to do with herself, and it took her to the stage. I first saw her live when she toured here in Gypsy. To take nothing away from Ethel Merman‘s Mama Rose, (which I enjoyed immensely), Lansbury’s though formidable, was also touching. While in town, she did a retrospective and Q&A session at the Esquire theater. What a treat to observe her out of the shell of any character for once.

Her triumphal turn as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd was so wickedly delicious I had to go back and see it again. I cherish her every inflection as “Nothing’s Gonna Harm You” and “Have a Little Priest” replay in my head.

John and Ann and I were in stitches at her blissfully hilarious capers as Madame Arcati in Blithe Spirit. We waited outside for an autograph in a light mist of rain. She signed program after program and posed for pictures not just patiently but with warmth and an air of “hasn’t this been fun?” What a difference from Rupert Everett who bolted at the sight of the stage door crowd.

The last time I saw her was as Madame Armfeld in A Little Night Music. The role fitted her like a second skin. She had a particular affinity for Sondheim’s music and characters. It’s a crime that he never got to write the Sunset Boulevard he envisioned for her. What a meal she’d have made of a Sondheim Norma Desmond.

I never watched her in what was her most popular and lucrative role. Murder She Wrote ran forever, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. Still, I was happy it gave her the financial independence to do whatever she chose, and she always chose well.

Lord, how I’ll miss her. Thank God for the movies.

Hurtling into winter

It’s one-ish in the afternoon, and dark. It snowed while I slept. Autumn has been kicked to the curb. Color has been yanked unceremoniously from the trees. Begonias that bloomed valiantly until Saturday now droop like overcooked asparagus. Fortunately, I’ve had the good sense to squirrel away some sights, sounds, and flavors to warm me this winter.

Flavors first. Kitaro should put me on salary. In the space of a few weeks, I’ve taken six different friends there, none of them easy marks at the table. All six effused about both menu and ambience and said they’d happily go back with or without me. They sampled widely, as I mean to do, but for now, I can’t get enough of their pork dumplings and seared tuna. Then there was Gamba, always deeply satisfying, for Lois’ birthday. She tried a salad-y thing I’ve forgotten the name of, with everything you’d want for savor and crunch lightly done up in aspic. I fought her for it, between bites of my flatiron steak done to a perfect temperature introduced to me by the resourceful Josh: rare plus. Lois was with me again at Vito and Nick’s which Tim has long been raving about. The pizza didn’t disappoint; you can watch them make it, and the room itself is fun, like being in your Italian uncle’s basement. Finally, there was a small gathering at Giovanni’s, which I mention only because of the Caesar salad debacle. They do a good one, but oh my. $6.00 extra and then you are asked if you want anchovies (if not, why are you ordering a Caesar?} and how many. They need to know before totting up your bill. The little dears are now twenty-five cents apiece. Is Giovanni’s falling on hard times?

Sight and sounds: Siegfried lasts five hours, but to me they zip by all too quickly. The new production is quirky and surprisingly cheerful. Before the curtain rises, you notice a huge claw protruding from beneath it, evoking Where the Wild Things Are. The character of Siegfried can charitably be described as childlike. My box mate, Bernie, reminded me how satirist Anna Russell described him. “Siegfried is so strong, so brave, so handsome, so stupid.” The set addresses that immediately by putting him in a giant playpen, surrounded by toys, a high-chair, and walls scrawled with colorful, childish doodles, including the dragon to come (and what a fearsome dragon he turns out to be). My sole quibble with this imaginative stage design is that, as in last season’s Walkure, Brunhilda‘s ring of magic fire is represented by those goofy red neon broken links that defy you not to think of an Oscar Mayer weenie roast. It was gloriously sung and conducted, and despite all the whimsy, powerful enough to sweep you away.

There’ve also been a couple of good movies. The Happy Prince is possibly better than I think it is because I was sleepy and drowsed through the first half hour or so. There’s nothing happy about this prince, Oscar Wilde at the end of his life, just out of prison, broke and ostracized. It’s a meaty part for the right actor, and Rupert Everett makes the most of it.

As to Bohemian Rhapsody, which I’ve now seen twice (the second time to accommodate a pal), it may be worse than I think it is because, though I thoroughly enjoyed it, the reviews have been uniformly dismissive. The main complaints were that the script takes liberties with dates and sequences of events, and that it is conventional and predictable in the manner of musical bios of the ’40’s. When Cole Porter was asked how he could stand the hokey Night and Day, he replied, “I loved it! They used dozens of my songs, and I’m played by Cary Grant.” Like Porter, I’m afraid I wasn’t put off by any cheesiness. I was having too good a time bingeing on the sounds of Queen (I’m not much of a rocker, but then as now, every single Queen song made me sit up and take happy notice). And then there’s Rami Malek, the one element universally singled out for praise. No one thought he was miscast. It’s one of the year’s strongest performances. If you like nothing else about the film, the last twenty minutes, the Live Aid set, are riveting. Even twice.

Okay. On to winter. Now if I can only find somebody to shovel the snow.