TV - Movies
How Angela
Lansbury's Age
Caused A Problem
On The Set Of
Gaslight
By JENNIFER MASHUGA
Actress Angela Lansbury tragically passed away on October 11, 2022, prompting fans to take a look back at her long and vibrant career. Some may remember her best for voicing Mrs. Potts in 1991’s “Beauty and the Beast,” while others might cite her character Jessica Fletcher in “Murder, She Wrote” as her most memorable performance — but there’s no denying her legacy.
Lansbury was still a teenager during her first role in the film “Gaslight,” but problems arose on set since her character Nancy smoked, an act Lansbury would not be allowed to do until she was 18. The solution was to film all scenes in which Nancy smoked after the actress’ 18th birthday, and Lansbury's on-set social worker made sure this stipulation was followed.
In an NPR interview, Lansbury recalled the moment that she "was able to take a cigarette out of a packet in my purse and smoke it, which I hadn't been able to let on, that I had been smoking from the time I was, really, about 14 years old." No one was allowed to swear in front of the teenager either, and her ears were often covered to avoid director George Cukor’s language.