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 346 (1967) (also, the second most: 303 (1969), and third: 294 (1968))
 Most free throw attempts in a season: 274 (1967)
 Most points in a single game: 61
 Most field goals in a single game: 26 (vs. Washington State, February 25, 1967)

He is represented in the top ten in a number of other school records, including season and career rebounds, second only to Bill Walton.Professional career

Milwaukee Bucks (1969–1975)

Rookie of the Year (1969–1970)

The Harlem Globetrotters offered Alcindor $1 million to play for them, but he declined and was picked first in the 1969 NBA draft by the Milwaukee Bucks, who were in only their second season of existence. The Bucks won a coin-toss with the Phoenix Suns for first pick. He was also chosen first overall in the 1969 American Basketball Association draft by the New York Nets. The Nets believed that they had the upper hand in securing Alcindor's services because he was from New York; however, when Alcindor told both the Bucks and the Nets that he would accept only one offer from each team, the Nets bid too low. Sam Gilbert negotiated the contract along with Los Angeles businessman Ralph Shapiro at no charge. After Alcindor chose the Milwaukee Bucks' offer of $1.4 million, the Nets offered a guaranteed $3.25 million. Alcindor declined the offer, saying, "A bidding war degrades the people involved.It would make me feel like a flesh peddler, and I don't want to think like that." Alcindor's presence enabled the 1969–70 Bucks to claim second place in the NBA's Eastern Division with a 56–26 record (improved from 27–55 the previous


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 year). On February 21, 1970, he scored 51 points in a 140–127 win over the SuperSonics. Alcindor was an instant star, ranking second in the league in scoring (28.8 ppg) and third in rebounding (14.5 rpg), for which he was awarded the title of NBA Rookie of the Year. In the series-clinching game against the 76ers, he recorded 46 points and 25 rebounds. He was the second rookie to score at least 40 points and 25 rebounds in a playoff game (with the first being Wilt Chamberlain). He also set an NBA rookie record with 10 or more games of 20+ points scored during the playoffs, tied by Jayson Tatum in 2018.First championship, MVP, and Finals MVP (1970–1971)
The next season, the Bucks acquired All-Star guard Oscar Robertson. Milwaukee went on to record the best record in the league with 66 victories in the 1970–71 season, including a then-record 20 straight wins. Alcindor was awarded his first of six NBA Most Valuable Player Awards, along with his first scoring title (31.7 ppg). He also led the league in total points, with 2,596. The Bucks won the NBA title, sweeping the Baltimore Bullets 4–0 in the 1971 NBA Finals. Alcindor posted 27 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists in Game 4, and he was named the Finals MVP after averaging 27 points per game on 60.5% shooting in the series. MVP recognition and trade request (1971–1975)
During the offseason, Alcindor and Robertson joined Bucks head coach Larry Costello on a three-week basketball tour of Africa on behalf of the State Department.In a press conference at the State Department on June 3, 1971, he stated that going


texts: forward, he wanted to be called by his Muslim name, <mask> Abdul-Jabbar (, Karīm Abd al-Jabbār), its translation roughly "noble one, servant of the Almighty [i.e., servant of Allah]". Abdul-Jabbar remained a dominant force for the Bucks. The following year, he repeated as scoring champion (34.8 ppg and 2,822 total points) and became the first player to be named the NBA Most Valuable Player twice in his first three years. In 1974, Abdul-Jabbar led the Bucks to their fourth consecutive Midwest Division title, and he won his third MVP Award in four years. He was among the top five NBA players in scoring (27.0 ppg, third), rebounding (14.5 rpg, fourth), blocked shots (283, second), and field goal percentage (.539, second). Robertson, who became a free agent in the offseason, retired in September 1974 after he was unable to agree on a contract with the Bucks. On October 3, Abdul-Jabbar privately requested a trade to the New York Knicks, with his second choice being the Washington Bullets (now the Wizards) and his third, the Los Angeles Lakers.He had never spoken negatively of the city of Milwaukee or its fans, but he said that being in the Midwest did not fit his cultural needs. Two days later in a pre-season game before the 1974–75 season against the Boston Celtics in Buffalo, New York, Abdul-Jabbar caught a fingernail in his left eye from Don Nelson and suffered a corneal abrasion; this angered him enough to punch the backboard stanchion, breaking two bones in his right hand. He missed the first 16 games of the season, during which the Bucks were 3–13, and returned


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 in late November wearing protective goggles. On March 13, 1975, sportscaster Marv Albert reported that Abdul-Jabbar requested a trade to either New York or Los Angeles, preferably to the Knicks. The following day after a loss in Milwaukee to the Lakers, Abdul-Jabbar confirmed to reporters his desire to play in another city. He averaged 30.0 points during the season, but Milwaukee finished in last place in the division at 38–44. Los Angeles Lakers (1975–1989)

Fourth and fifth MVP awards (1975–1977)
In 1975, the Lakers acquired Abdul-Jabbar and reserve center Walt Wesley from the Bucks for center Elmore Smith, guard Brian Winters, blue-chip rookies Dave Meyers and Junior Bridgeman, and cash.In the 1975–76 season, his first with the Lakers, he had a dominating season, averaging 27.7 points per game and leading the league in rebounding (16.9), blocked shots (4.12), and total minutes played (3,379). His 1,111 defensive rebounds remains the NBA single-season record (defensive rebounds were not recorded prior to the 1973–74 season). He earned his fourth MVP award, becoming the first winner in Lakers' franchise history, but missed the post-season for the second straight year as the Lakers finished 40–42. Afer acquiring a cast of no-name free agents, the Lakers were projected to finished near the bottom of the Pacific Division in 1976–77. However, Abdul-Jabbar helped lead the team to the best record (53–29) in the NBA. He won his fifth MVP award, tying Bill Russell's record. Abdul-Jabbar led the league in field goal percentage (.579), was third in scoring (26.2), and was


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 second in rebounds (13.3) and blocked shots (3.18).In the playoffs, the Lakers beat the Golden State Warriors in the Western Conference semi-finals, setting up a confrontation with the Portland Trail Blazers. The result was a memorable matchup, pitting Abdul-Jabbar against a young, injury-free Bill Walton. Although Abdul-Jabbar dominated the series statistically, Walton and the Trail Blazers (who were experiencing their first-ever run in the playoffs) swept the Lakers, behind Walton's skillful passing and timely plays. Playoff disappointments (1977–1979)
Two minutes into the opening game of the 1977–78 season, Abdul-Jabbar broke his right hand punching Milwaukee's Kent Benson in retaliation to the rookie's elbow to his stomach. Benson suffered a black right eye and required two stitches. According to Benson, Abdul-Jabbar initiated the elbowing, but there were no witnesses and it was not captured on replays. Abdul-Jabbar, who broke the same bone in 1975 after he punched the backboard support, was out for almost two months and missed 20 games.He was fined a then-league record $5,000 but was not suspended. Benson missed one game but was not punished by the league. The Lakers were 8–13 when Abdul-Jabbar returned. He was not named to the 1978 NBA All-Star Game, the only time in his 20-year career he was not selected to an All-Star Game. Chicago's Artis Gilmore and Detroit's Bob Lanier were chosen as reserves for the West, with Walton starting
at center. Amid criticism from the media over his performance, Abdul-Jabbar had 39 points, 20 rebounds, six assists and four


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 blocks in a win over the Philadelphia 76ers the day the All-Star rosters were announced. He added 37 points and 30 rebounds in a victory over the New Jersey Nets (now Brooklyn) in the final game before the All-Star break.Abdul-Jabbar's play remained strong during the next two seasons, being named to the All-NBA Second Team twice, the All-Defense First Team once, and the All-Defense Second Team once. The Lakers, however, continued to be stymied in the playoffs, being eliminated by the Seattle SuperSonics in both 1978 (first round) and 1979 (semifinals). Last MVP award and championship success (1979–1985)
In 1979, the Lakers selected Magic Johnson with the first overall pick of the draft. They had acquired the pick from the New Orleans Jazz (later Utah) in 1976, when league rules required that they compensate Los Angeles for their signing of free agent Gail Goodrich. The addition of Johnson paved the way for a Laker dynasty of the 1980s, appearing in the finals eight times and winning five NBA championships. While less dominant than in his younger years, Abdul-Jabbar reinforced his status as one of the greatest basketball players ever, adding an additional four All-NBA First Team selections and two All-Defense First Team honors. He won his record sixth MVP award in 1980 and continued to average 20 or more points per game in the following six seasons.He won his second Finals MVP in 1985, when he became the oldest to win the award at 38 years and 54 days old. On April 5, 1984, Abdul-Jabbar broke Chamberlain's record for most career points. While in Los Angeles,


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 Abdul-Jabbar started doing yoga in 1976 to improve his flexibility, and was notable for his physical fitness regimen. He says, "There is no way I could have played as long as I did without yoga." In 1983, Abdul-Jabbar's house burned down. Many of his belongings, including his beloved jazz LP collection of about 3,000 albums, were destroyed. Many Lakers fans sent and brought him albums, which he found uplifting.Final playing years and sixth ring (1985–1989)
Prior to the 1986–87 season, Abdul-Jabbar gained , reaching close to , to compete against the growing number of 7-footers (2.1 m) in the league. The Lakers advanced to the NBA Finals in each of his final three seasons, defeating Boston in 1987, and Detroit in 1988. The Lakers lost to the Pistons in a four-game sweep in his final season. After winning Game 7 of the 1988 finals, the 41-year-old Abdul-Jabbar announced in the locker room that he would return for one more season before retiring. His points, rebounds, and minutes had dropped in his 19th season, and there were reports prior to the game that he was retiring after the contest. On his "retirement tour" he received standing ovations at games, both home and away, and gifts ranging from a yacht that said "Captain Skyhook" to framed jerseys from his career to a Persian rug. At the Forum against Seattle in his final regular season game, every Laker came onto the court wearing Abdul-Jabbar's trademark goggles.At the time of his retirement, Abdul-Jabbar held the record for most career games played in the NBA; this would later be broken by Robert Parish. He also


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 was the all-time record holder for most points (38,387), most field goals made (15,837), and most minutes played (57,446). Coaching career
In 1995, Abdul-Jabbar began expressing an interest in coaching and imparting knowledge from his playing days. His opportunities were limited despite the success he enjoyed during his playing days. During his playing years, Abdul-Jabbar had developed a reputation for being introverted and sullen. He was often unfriendly with the media. His sensitivity and shyness created a perception of him being aloof and surly.At the time, his mentality was that he either did not have the time or did not owe anything to anyone. Magic Johnson recalled as a kid being brushed off after asking him for an autograph. Abdul-Jabbar might freeze out a reporter if they touched him, and he once refused to stop reading the newspaper while giving an interview. Abdul-Jabbar had spent most of his career with a reserved attitude towards media attention (since he did not have to deal with it as a star at UCLA) before he softened up near the end of his career. Abdul-Jabbar said: "I didn't understand that I also had affected people that way and that's what it was all about. I always saw it like they were trying to pry. I was way too suspicious and I paid a price for it."However, he believes it was his reputation as a "difficult person", alongside his attempts at trying to break into coaching while nearing the age of fifty, that affected his chances of becoming a head coach within the NBA or NCAA. Abdul-Jabbar worked as an assistant for the Los Angeles Clippers


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 and the Seattle SuperSonics, helping mentor, among others, their young centers, Michael Olowokandi and Jerome James. Abdul-Jabbar was the head coach of the Oklahoma Storm of the United States Basketball League in 2002, leading the team to the league's championship that season, but he failed to land the head coaching position at Columbia University a year later. He then worked as a scout for the New York Knicks. He returned to the Lakers as a special assistant coach to Phil Jackson for six seasons (2005–2011). Early on, he mentored their young center, Andrew Bynum. Abdul-Jabbar also served as a volunteer coach at Alchesay High School on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in Whiteriver, Arizona, in 1998.He moved on from coaching in 2013 after unsuccessfully lobbying for open head coach positions with UCLA and the Milwaukee Bucks. Player profile
On offense, Abdul-Jabbar was a dominant low-post threat. In contrast to other low-post specialists like Wilt Chamberlain, Artis Gilmore or Shaquille O'Neal, Abdul-Jabbar was a relatively slender player, standing  tall while weighing around  to , although he bulked to  in 1986; in his early years, he used that frame for agility and speed while in later years he utilized a bigger frame for trying to guard under the basket. He was famous for his ambidextrous skyhook shot. It contributed to his high .559 field goal accuracy, making him the eighth-most accurate scorer of all time and a feared clutch shooter. Abdul-Jabbar maintained a dominant presence on defense. He was selected to the NBA All-Defensive Team eleven times.He


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 frustrated opponents with his superior shot-blocking ability and denied an average of 2.6 shots a game. After the pounding he endured early in his career, his rebounding average fell to between six or eight a game in his latter years. As a teammate, Abdul-Jabbar exuded natural leadership and was affectionately called "Cap" or "Captain" by his colleagues. He had an even temperament, which Riley said made him coachable. A strict fitness regime made him one of the most durable players of all time. In 1985–86, Abdul-Jabbar broke the previous NBA record of 16 seasons held by Dolph Schayes, John Havlicek, Paul Silas, and Elvin Hayes; he finished his career with a then-record 20 seasons played. In the NBA, his 20 seasons and 1,560 games are performances surpassed only by former Celtics center Robert Parish.Abdul-Jabbar began wearing his trademark goggles after getting poked in the eye during preseason in 1975. He continued wearing them for years until abandoning them in the 1979 playoffs. He resumed wearing goggles in October 1980 after being accidentally poked in the right eye by Houston's Rudy Tomjanovich. After years of being jabbed in the eyes, Abdul-Jabbar developed corneal erosion syndrome, occasionally experiencing pain when his eyes dry up. He missed three games in December 1986 due to the condition. Skyhook
Abdul-Jabbar was well known for his trademark "skyhook", a hook shot in which he bent his entire body (rather than just the arm) like a straw in one fluid motion to raise the ball and then release it at the highest point of his arm's arching motion. With his


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 long arms and great height, the skyhook was difficult for a defender to block without committing a goaltending violation.As a right-handed player, he was stronger shooting the skyhook with his right hand than he was with his left, although he was adept at shooting it with either hand, making it a reliable and feared offensive weapon. According to Abdul-Jabbar, he learned the move in fifth grade after practicing with the Mikan Drill and soon learned to value it, as it was "the only shot I could use that didn't get smashed back in my face". Legacy
Abdul-Jabbar is the NBA's all-time leading scorer with 38,387 points, and he won a league-record six MVP awards. He earned six championship rings, two Finals MVP awards, 15 NBA First or Second Teams, a record 19 NBA All-Star call-ups and averaging 24.6 points, 11.2 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 2.6 blocks per game. He is ranked as the NBA's third leading all-time rebounder (17,440). He is also the third all-time in registered blocks (3,189), which is especially impressive because this stat was not recorded until the fourth year of his career (1974). Abdul-Jabbar combined dominance during his career peak with the longevity and sustained excellence of his later years.He credited Bruce Lee with teaching him "the discipline and spirituality of martial arts, which was greatly responsible for me being able to play competitively in the NBA for 20 years with very few injuries." After claiming his sixth and final MVP in 1980, Abdul-Jabbar continued to average above 20 points in the following six seasons, including 23 points per game in


texts: his 17th season at age 38. He was named to the NBA's 35th, 50th and 75th anniversary teams. Abdul-Jabbar is regarded as one of the best centers ever, and league experts and basketball legends frequently mentioned him when considering the greatest player of all time. Former Lakers coach Pat Riley once said, "Why judge anymore? When a man has broken records, won championships, endured tremendous criticism and responsibility, why judge? Let's toast him as the greatest player ever."Isiah Thomas remarked, "If they say the numbers don't lie, then Kareem is the greatest ever to play the game." Julius Erving in 2013 said, "In terms of players all-time, Kareem is still the number one guy. He's the guy you gotta start your franchise with." In 2015, ESPN named Abdul-Jabbar the best center in NBA history, and ranked him No. 2 behind Michael Jordan among the greatest NBA players ever. While Jordan's shots were enthralling and considered unfathomable, Abdul-Jabbar's skyhook appeared automatic, and he himself called the shot "unsexy". Abdul-Jabbar's only recognized rookie card became the most expensive basketball card ever sold when it went for $501,900 at auction in 2016.That record has since been surpassed. He made his film debut in Bruce Lee's 1972 film Game of Death, in which his character Hakim fights Billy Lo (played by Lee). In 1980, he played co-pilot Roger Murdock in Airplane!. Abdul-Jabbar has a scene in which a little boy looks at him and remarks that he is in fact Abdul-Jabbar, spoofing the appearance of football star Elroy "Crazylegs" Hirsch as an airplane pilot in


texts: the 1957 drama that served as the inspiration for Airplane!, Zero Hour!. Staying in character, Abdul-Jabbar states that he is merely Roger Murdock, an airline co-pilot, but the boy continues to insist that Abdul-Jabbar is "the greatest", but that, according to his father, he doesn't "work hard on defense" and that he does not "really try, except during the playoffs". This causes Abdul-Jabbar's character to snap, "The hell I don't! ", then grabs the boy and snarls that he has "been hearing that crap ever ever since I was at UCLA" and been "busting my buns every night!".He instructs the boy to "Tell your old man old man to drag [Bill] Walton and [Bob] Lanier up and down the court for 48 minutes". When Murdock loses consciousness later in the film, he collapses at the controls wearing Abdul-Jabbar's goggles and yellow Lakers' shorts. In 2014, Abdul-Jabbar and  Airplane! co-star Robert Hays (character Ted Striker) reprised their Airplane! roles in a parody commercial promoting Wisconsin tourism. Abdul-Jabbar has had numerous other television and film appearances, often playing himself. He has had roles in movies such as Fletch, Troop Beverly Hills and Forget Paris, and television series such as Full House, Living Single, Amen, Everybody Loves Raymond, Martin, Diff'rent Strokes (his height humorously contrasted with that of diminutive child star Gary Coleman), The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Scrubs, 21 Jump Street, Emergency!, Man from Atlantis, and New Girl.Abdul-Jabbar played a genie in a lamp in a 1984 episode of Tales from the Darkside. He also played himself on the


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 February 10, 1994, episode of the sketch comedy television series In Living Color. He also appeared in the television version of Stephen King's The Stand, played the Archangel of Basketball in Slam Dunk Ernest, and had a brief non-speaking cameo appearance in BASEketball. Abdul-Jabbar was also the co-executive producer of the 1994 TV film The Vernon Johns Story. He has also made appearances on The Colbert Report, in a 2006 skit called "HipHopKetball II: The ReJazzebration Remix '06" and in 2008 as a stage manager who is sent out on a mission to find Nazi gold. Abdul-Jabbar also voiced himself in a 2011 episode of The Simpsons titled "Love Is a Many Strangled Thing". He had a recurring role as himself on the NBC series Guys with Kids, which aired from 2012 to 2013.On Al Jazeera English he expressed his desire to be remembered not just as a player, but also as somebody who used their mind and made other contributions. In February 2019, he appeared in season 12 episode 16 of The Big Bang Theory, "The D&D Vortex". Abdul-Jabbar made a guest appearance as himself in a season 2 episode of Dave. The episode he appeared in was also named after him. Writing

In September 2018, Abdul-Jabbar was announced as one of the writers for the July 2019 revival of Veronica Mars. Documentaries

On February 10, 2011, Abdul-Jabbar debuted his film On the Shoulders of Giants, documenting the tumultuous journey of the famed yet often-overlooked Harlem Renaissance professional basketball team, at Science Park High School in Newark, New Jersey. The event was simulcast live throughout the


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 school, city, and state.In 2015, he appeared in an HBO documentary on his life, Kareem: Minority of One. In 2020, Abdul-Jabbar was the executive producer and narrator of the History channel special Black Patriots: Heroes of the Revolution. He was nominated for an Emmy Award for his narration. Reality television

Abdul-Jabbar participated in the 2013 ABC reality series Splash, a celebrity diving competition. In April 2018, Abdul-Jabbar competed in the all-athlete season of season 26 of Dancing with the Stars and partnered with professional dancer Lindsay Arnold. Writing and activism

Abdul-Jabbar became a best-selling author and cultural critic. He published several books, mostly on African-American history.His first book, his autobiography Giant Steps, was written in 1983 with co-author Peter Knobler. The book's title is an homage to jazz great John Coltrane, referring to his album Giant Steps. Others include On the Shoulders of Giants: My Journey Through the Harlem Renaissance, co-written with Raymond Obstfeld, and Brothers in Arms: The Epic Story of the 761st Tank Battalion, World War II's Forgotten Heroes, co-written with Anthony Walton, which is a history of the first black armored unit to fight in World War II. Abdul-Jabbar has also been a regular contributor to discussions about issues of race and religion, among other topics, in national magazines and on television. He has written a regular column for Time, for example, and he appeared on Meet the Press on Sunday, January 25, 2015, to talk about a recent column, which pointed out that Islam should not be


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 blamed for the actions of violent extremists, just as Christianity has not been blamed for the actions of violent extremists who profess Christianity. When asked about being Muslim, he said: "I don't have any misgiving about my faith. I'm very concerned about the people who claim to be Muslims that are murdering people and creating all this mayhem in the world.That is not what Islam is about, and that should not be what people think of when they think about Muslims. But it's up to all of us to do something about all of it." In November 2014, Abdul-Jabbar published an essay in Jacobin magazine calling for just compensation for college athletes, writing, "in the name of fairness, we must bring an end to the indentured servitude of college athletes and start paying them what they are worth." Commenting on Donald Trump's 2017 travel ban, he strongly condemned it, saying, "The absence of reason and compassion is the very definition of pure evil because it is a rejection of our sacred values, distilled from millennia of struggle." Government appointments

Cultural ambassador

In January 2012, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that Abdul-Jabbar had accepted a position as a cultural ambassador for the United States. During the announcement press conference, Abdul-Jabbar commented on the historical legacy of African-Americans as representatives of U.S. culture: "I remember when Louis Armstrong first did it back for President Kennedy, one of my heroes. So it's nice to be following in his footsteps."As part of this role, Abdul-Jabbar has traveled to


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 Brazil to promote education for local youths. President's Council on Fitness, Sports, and Nutrition
Former President Barack Obama announced in his last days of office that he has appointed Abdul-Jabbar along with Gabrielle Douglas and Carli Lloyd to the President's Council on Fitness, Sports, and Nutrition. Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee
In January 2017, Abdul-Jabbar was appointed to the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee by United States Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin. According to the United States Mint, Abdul-Jabbar is a keen coin collector whose interest in the life of Alexander Hamilton had led him into the hobby. He resigned in 2018 due to what the Mint described as "increasing personal obligations". Personal life

Abdul-Jabbar met Habiba Abdul-Jabbar (born Janice Brown) at a Lakers game during his senior year at UCLA. They eventually married and together had three children: daughters Habiba and Sultana and son <mask> Jr., who played basketball at Western Kentucky after attending Valparaiso.Abdul-Jabbar and Janice divorced in 1978. He has another son, Amir, with Cheryl Pistono. Another son, Adam, made an appearance on the TV sitcom Full House with him. In 2016, Abdul-Jabbar performed a tribute to friend Muhammad Ali along with Chance the Rapper. Religion and name
At age 24 in 1971, he converted to Islam and became Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, which means "noble one, servant of the Almighty." He was named by Hamaas Abdul Khaalis. Abdul-Jabbar purchased and donated 7700 16th Street NW, a house in Washington, D.C., for Khaalis to use as the Hanafi


texts: Madh-Hab Center.Eventually, Kareem "found that [he] disagreed with some of Hamaas' teachings about the Quran, and [they] parted ways." He then studied the Quran on his own, and "emerged from this pilgrimage with my beliefs clarified and my faith renewed." Abdul-Jabbar was also heavily influenced by Malcolm X, a leader of the Nation of Islam. Abdul-Jabbar was invited to join the group, but he refused. Abdul-Jabbar has spoken about the thinking that was behind his name change when he converted to Islam. He stated that he was "latching on to something that was part of my heritage, because many of the slaves who were brought here were Muslims. My family was brought to America by a French planter named Alcindor, who came here from Trinidad in the 18th century.My people were Yoruba, and their culture survived slavery...  My father found out about that when I was a kid, and it gave me all I needed to know that, hey, I was somebody, even if nobody else knew about it. When I was a kid, no one would believe anything positive that you could say about black people. And that's a terrible burden on black people, because they don't have an accurate idea of their history, which has been either suppressed or distorted." His name change further eroded his public image in the United States, mostly in white areas. In 1998, Abdul-Jabbar reached a settlement after he sued Miami Dolphins running back Karim Abdul-Jabbar (now Abdul-Karim al-Jabbar, born Sharmon Shah) because he felt Karim was profiting off the name he made famous by having the Abdul-Jabbar moniker and number 33 on his


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 Dolphins jersey. As a result, the younger Abdul-Jabbar had to change his jersey nameplate to simply "Abdul" while playing for the Dolphins. The football player had also been an athlete at UCLA.Health problems
Abdul-Jabbar suffers from migraines, and his use of cannabis to reduce the symptoms has had legal ramifications. In November 2009, Abdul-Jabbar announced that he was suffering from a form of leukemia, Philadelphia chromosome-positive chronic myeloid leukemia, a cancer of the blood and bone marrow. The disease was diagnosed in December 2008, but Abdul-Jabbar said his condition could be managed by taking oral medication daily, seeing his specialist every other month and having his blood analyzed regularly. He expressed in a 2009 press conference that he did not believe that the illness would stop him from leading a normal life. Abdul-Jabbar is now a spokesman for Novartis, the company that produces his cancer medication, Gleevec. In February 2011, Abdul-Jabbar announced via Twitter that his leukemia was gone and he was "100% cancer free". A few days later, he clarified his misstatement."You're never really cancer-free and I should have known that," Abdul-Jabbar said. "My cancer right now is at an absolute minimum." In April 2015, Abdul-Jabbar was admitted to hospital when he was diagnosed with cardiovascular disease. Later that week, on his 68th birthday, he underwent quadruple coronary bypass surgery at the UCLA Medical Center. Non-athletic honors
In 2016, Abdul-Jabbar was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by outgoing U.S. President Barack Obama. In


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 2011, Abdul-Jabbar was awarded the Double Helix Medal for his work in raising awareness for cancer research. Also in 2011, Abdul-Jabbar received an honorary degree from New York Institute of Technology.In 2020, Abdul-Jabbar was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Narrator for his work on the documentary special Black Patriots: Heroes of The Revolution. Works

Books

 Kareem, with Mignon McCarthy (1990)
 Selected from Giant Steps (Writers' Voices) (1999)
 Black Profiles in Courage: A Legacy of African-American Achievement, with Alan Steinberg (1996)
 A Season on the Reservation: My Sojourn with the White Mountain Apaches, with Stephen Singular (2000)
 Brothers in Arms: The Epic Story of the 761st Tank Battalion, World War II's Forgotten Heroes with Anthony Walton (2004)
 On the Shoulders of Giants: My Journey Through the Harlem Renaissance with Raymond Obstfeld (2007)
 What Color Is My World? The Lost History of African American Inventors with Raymond Obstfeld (2012)
 Streetball Crew Book One Sasquatch in the Paint with Raymond Obstfeld (2013)
 Streetball Crew Book Two Stealing the Game with Raymond Obstfeld (2015)
 Mycroft Holmes with Anna Waterhouse (September 2015)
 Writings on the Wall: Searching for a New Equality Beyond Black and White with Raymond Obstfeld (2016)
 Coach Wooden and Me: Our 50-Year Friendship On and Off the Court (2017)
 Becoming Kareem: Growing Up On and Off the Court (2017)

 Mycroft and Sherlock with Anna Waterhouse (October 9, 2018)
 Mycroft and Sherlock: The Empty Birdcage with Anna Waterhouse (September


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 24, 2019)

Audio book
 On the Shoulders of Giants: An Audio Journey Through the Harlem Renaissance 8-CD Set Vol. 1–4, with Avery Brooks, Jesse L. Martin, Maya Angelou, Herbie Hancock, Billy Crystal, Charles Barkley, James Worthy, Julius Erving, Jerry West, Clyde Drexler, Bill Russell, Coach John Wooden, Stanley Crouch, Quincy Jones and other chart-topping musicians, as well as legendary actors and performers such as Samuel L.


texts: Major General <mask>,  (10 February 1885 – 5 March 1945) was an Australian soldier, general, surgeon and historian in the first half of the 20th century. <mask> attended the University of Melbourne, graduating with his medical degrees in 1907. He returned to the university to pursue a Doctor of Medicine degree, which was awarded in 1911. The son of British Army officer Major <mask>, <mask> joined the Army as a trumpeter while he was still at school. He was commissioned as a captain in the Australian Army Medical Corps in 1908, and joined the First Australian Imperial Force (AIF) in 1914 as its youngest lieutenant colonel. He served in the Gallipoli campaign, and was appointed Assistant Director of Medical Services (ADMS) of the newly formed ANZAC Mounted Division in 1916, which he combined with the post of ADMS AIF Egypt. In 1917, he became Deputy Director of Medical Services (DDMS) of the Desert Mounted Corps.After the war, he wrote articles on medical aspects of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign, and the section on the campaign for the official history. Returning to Australia, <mask> became an honorary consulting surgeon at the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne and Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, and honorary surgeon at Prince Henry's Hospital. He became a foundation fellow of the College of Surgeons of Australasia in 1927, and president of the Victorian branch of the British Medical Association in 1935. He lectured on medical ethics at the University of Melbourne, writing the course textbook. He was also Victorian State Commissioner of the St. John Ambulance Brigade, which he led for 25 years, and was president of the St John Ambulance Association

masks:
Rupert Major Downes
Downes
Francis Downes
Downes
Downes


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 for eight years. In 1934 <mask> became Director General of Medical Services, the Australian Army's most senior medical officer, with the rank of major general. He oversaw the construction of major military hospitals in the capital cities.In 1944 he accepted a commission to edit the medical series volumes of the Official History of Australia in the War of 1939–1945 but was never able to do so as he was killed in a plane crash in 1945. Education and early life
<mask> <mask> was born on 10 February 1885 in Mitcham, South Australia. He was the youngest of fifteen children of Colonel Major <mask>—a British Army officer—and his wife Helen Maria, formerly Chamberlin, only five of whom survived to adulthood. After service in the Crimean War, Colonel <mask> served as commandant of the Colonial forces of South Australia and Victoria and retired with the rank of major general in the Australian Army in 1902. <mask> was educated at Haileybury, Melbourne as a boarding student. In March 1901, at the age of 16, he joined the Victorian Horse Artillery (St Kilda Battery), a part-time volunteer militia unit, as a trumpeter. In May 1901 he served in this capacity at the opening of the inaugural Parliament of Australia by The Duke of Cornwall and York at the Royal Exhibition Building.In 1903, <mask> became a medical student at the University of Melbourne. A good result in his first year examinations earned him a residential scholarship to Ormond College, and he graduated with the double degree of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in 1907. Soon after graduation, <mask> enlisted in the Militia. He was commissioned as a captain in the Australian Army Medical

masks:
Downes
Rupert Major
Downes
Francis Downes
Francis Downes
Rupert
Downes
Downes


texts:
 Corps on 1 July 1908 and was promoted to major on 26 March 1913. He served his residency at Melbourne Hospital and became a general practitioner in Malvern, Victoria, but soon returned to the university to pursue a doctorate. His Doctor of Medicine (MD) thesis, entitled "The anatomical relations of the Thymus, especially considered in regard to thymic death with an account of cases of abnormality", was accepted in 1911. He also did the coursework for a Master of Surgery (MS), and this degree was conferred in 1912.<mask> married Doris Mary Robb on 20 November 1913 at St John's Church, Toorak, Victoria. They had three children: Rosemary Major, born in 1914; Valerie Major, born in March 1918; and <mask> Major, born in 1922. First World War
<mask> joined the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) on 2 October 1914, assuming command of the 2nd Light Horse Field Ambulance with the rank of lieutenant colonel—making him the youngest officer of that rank in the AIF at the time. Soon after his taking command, the unit was renamed the 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance. After training at the Broadmeadows Army Camp near Melbourne, the unit embarked for Egypt on the transport Chilka on 2 February 1915. The 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance departed Alexandria for Gallipoli on 17 May 1915. It moved to Lemnos in June, where it operated a hospital, but returned to ANZAC Cove for the August offensive.<mask> missed this operation, as he remained on Lemnos supervising the hospital until he returned to Anzac on 11 August. He remained with his unit until 13 November, when he departed for Lemnos and then Egypt. After the evacuation of Gallipoli, <mask> was appointed Assistant Director of

masks:
Downes
John Rupert
Downes
Downes
Downes


texts: Medical Services (ADMS) of the newly formed ANZAC Mounted Division on 15 March 1916. He was given the temporary rank of colonel, before substantive promotion on 20 February 1917. <mask> combined this post with that of ADMS AIF Egypt from 6 September 1916. <mask> therefore had to travel back and forth to Cairo. In November 1916, a Deputy ADMS was appointed to assist him.Medically speaking, the health of the Anzac Mounted Division was remarkably good, but the Sinai Peninsula still had its challenges—especially for medical officers unfamiliar with conditions in the Middle East. The Battle of Romani revealed the importance of transportation in an area with few roads. A poorly organised casualty evacuation effort caused a great deal of preventable hardship and suffering for the wounded, and resulted in a number of avoidable deaths. An inquiry into the matter was held after the battle, at which <mask> was called to testify. The Commander in Chief if the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF), General Sir Archibald Murray, declined to assign blame to any individual, but implemented the inquiry's recommendations for improving the casualty evacuation process. There was also the heat, and the problem of supplying adequate quantities of potable water. Diseases included cholera, typhus and bilharzia.To combat these, <mask> obtained the services of the Lieutenant Colonel Charles James Martin,  and created the Anzac Field Laboratory to investigate these diseases. As a result of aggressively tackling the problem, <mask> reduced rates of disease among Australian and New Zealand troops well below those of British troops serving alongside them. Martin advanced the notion that

masks: Downes Downes Downes Downes Downes


texts: heat exhaustion and heat stroke were not the result of defective evaporation, as had previously been believed, but simply a matter of failing to drink enough water. He in turn converted Downes to the belief that "provided water is available in adequate amount the heat mechanism of the body can defy all ordinary climatic ranges of temperature even under conditions of hard work." With so many people and horses, sanitation was a challenge, and discipline in this area was initially slack, as it had been with disastrous results at Gallipoli. <mask> took measures to improve the situation. Although not normally one to engage in disputes, <mask> repeatedly clashed with the British medical officers of the EEF, especially the DMS EEF, Colonel Alfred  Keble, whose attitudes <mask> regarded as endangering his troops.Doris travelled to Egypt to visit her husband in March 1917. By June, <mask> was becoming increasingly immersed in preparations for the Third Battle of Gaza and Doris, who had become pregnant during her visit, decided to return home. On her return journey to Australia in June 1917, her ship, the P&O liner Mongolia struck a mine and was sunk in the Indian Ocean with the loss of 23 lives. Doris spent 11 hours in a crowded lifeboat, before being rescued by a passing steamer, which took her to Bombay. From there she eventually made her way back to Australia via Singapore and Batavia. In 1918 Doris was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her volunteer work among soldiers' families as secretary of the Friendly Union of Soldiers' Wives and Mothers. On 10 August 1917, <mask> became Deputy Director of Medical Services (DDMS) of the

masks: Downes Downes Downes Rupert Downes


texts: Desert Mounted Corps, while still retaining the post of ADMS AIF Egypt.He was therefore answerable to three superiors—to Lieutenant General Harry Chauvel, the commander of the Desert Mounted Corps and AIF Egypt; to Major General Neville Howse, the DMS AIF in London; and to the new British DMS EEF, Major General William Travers Swan. As the EEF advanced into Palestine, the major medical problem remained transportation. During the operations in the Es Salt area, <mask> experimented with the delivery of drugs and medical supplies by air. In the Jordan valley in 1918, however, <mask> was confronted with an epidemic of malaria and vigorous preventative and prophylactic efforts were required in order to bring it under control. In October 1918, with victory near, <mask> was confronted by his most serious medical crisis. Damascus contained over 3,000 sick and wounded Turkish soldiers, many of them in appalling condition. <mask> appointed the DADMS of the Australian Mounted Division, Major W. Evans, as Principal Medical Officer of Damascus, and gave him orders to organise the medical arrangements, bury the dead and provide care for the living.The task was made more difficult by the poor communications and transport shortages, which hampered the delivery of supplies and evacuation of the hospitals; by shortages of medical units; and by the actions of Lieutenant Colonel T. E. Lawrence, who was more concerned with establishing the political authority of Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca over Damascus. At this point the Desert Mounted Corps itself began to experience epidemic diseases, particularly of bronchopneumonia, cholera and malaria, putting the medical services

masks: Downes Downes Downes Downes


texts:
 under enormous pressure. Through extraordinary measures, including the diversion of lighthorsemen and motor vehicles to medical units, <mask> managed to evacuate the sick to Beirut, and the crisis abated. For his service in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign, <mask> was mentioned in despatches four times, and was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George on 1 January 1918. His citation read:

Interwar years
Returning to Australia, <mask> was discharged from the AIF, but remained in the Army as a reservist. He became an honorary consulting surgeon at the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne and Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, and honorary surgeon at Prince Henry's Hospital. He was a founding fellow of the College of Surgeons of Australasia in 1927, and became president of the Victorian branch of the British Medical Association in 1935.He established a reputation as one of Melbourne's leading paediatric surgeons, but found himself in disagreement with certain medical practices then in vogue. In a 1922 paper published in the Medical Journal of Australia, he examined 100 cases of tonsillectomy in children, and concluded that the majority of them were unnecessary. It would be another four decades before the medical profession in Australia accepted this. He lectured on medical ethics at the University of Melbourne from the late 1930s until his death in 1945, and wrote a course textbook on the subject, entitled Medical Ethics, which was published in 1942. In addition to his medical writings, <mask> wrote a book-length section on the Sinai and Palestine campaign for Volume I of the Official History of the Australian Army Medical Services in


texts: the War of 1914–1918 in the late 1920s under the direction of Medical Series editor Graham Butler. The two men had discussed the prospect during a visit Butler made to Egypt in 1918 to inspect the medical records of the AIF, and again in France in 1919. <mask> published an article in the Journal of the British Army Medical Corps entitled "The Tactical Employment of the Medical Services in a Cavalry Corps" in 1926, which was expanded into one of the chapters of the Official History.<mask>' manuscript proved too long for the proposed book, and was extensively edited by Butler before it was published in 1930. <mask> was instrumental in supporting Butler's Medical Series and helped obtain the funding necessary to complete the project. <mask> was chairman of the Masseurs' Registration Board, a councillor of the Victorian division of the Australian Red Cross, and chairman of the Red Cross National Council. He was Victorian State Commissioner of the St. John Ambulance Brigade for 25 years. He was also president of the St John Ambulance Association for eight years, and chairman of the Victorian Civil Ambulance Service from 1937 to 1938. In 1930, he was appointed a Commander of the Venerable Order of Saint John, and later became a Knight of Grace of the order in 1937. At the same time, Doris became an Officer of the Order of Saint John, in recognition for her fund raising efforts for the Victorian branch.She also later served as a member of its council from 1942 to 1953. <mask> was instrumental in persuading the various state branches to come together as a national organisation, arguing that without a national body, the organisation would be eclipsed by the Red


texts: Cross. In 1930, <mask>' son John, then in his first year as a boarder at Geelong Grammar School, fell seriously ill with meningitis. Despite the best efforts of two eminent medical practitioners, Dr Keith Fairley and Dr Reginald Webster, John succumbed to toxaemia and died in 1933, at the age of 10. The failure of modern medicine to save his son affected <mask> deeply, and led him to abandon his medical career in favour of a military one. <mask> remained in the Army throughout the inter-war period. He became a colonel in the Australian Army Medical Corps on 8 January 1920.He was DDMS of the 3rd Military District (Victoria) from 1 July 1921 to 26 June 1933, and Officer in Charge of Voluntary Aid Detachments from 1 July 1921 to 15 March 1940. He also served as head of the medical services of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Although the RAAF had become a separate service in 1921, the Minister for Defence decided in 1927 that the Army's Director General of Medical Services should be responsible for the administration of the RAAF's medical services. In this capacity, <mask> was answerable to the Air Board. In addition, he was honorary surgeon to the Governor General of Australia from 1 July 1927 to 30 June 1931. On 20 August 1934 <mask> became Director General of Medical Services (DGMS), a full-time post and the Army's most senior medical officer. His priority was a recruiting campaign to increase the number of medical professionals in the Army.The Munich Crisis caused people to believe that another war was imminent, and an Army-wide recruiting campaign led by Major General Sir Thomas Blamey doubled the size of the Army from 35,000 in 1938 to 70,000 in


texts:
 1939. <mask>' efforts at recruiting were far more modest. In 1934, there were 299 part-time officers in the AAMC; by 1939 there were 394, and increase of only 32 per cent. This included 320 medical practitioners, 37 dentists and 13 pharmacists. <mask> was acutely aware that a large Army would require mobilisation of the country's doctors, and pushed for all doctors to be prepared for either military service or direction by civil authorities. He presided over a major effort to stockpile drugs and medical equipment required for a mobilisation. With the help of the Department of Health and the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories, most of this was delivered by July 1939.In 1939, <mask> began a tour of military and other medical centres in India, the Middle East, the United Kingdom, France, the United States and Canada. While in London, he arranged for Doris and Valerie to be formally presented to the King and Queen at Buckingham Palace by Ethel Bruce, the wife of Stanley Bruce, the Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. <mask> foresaw a major war, fought in the islands to the north of Australia. While in London, he took steps to obtain the services as consultants of two eminent Australian physicians, the surgeon Sir Thomas Dunhill and Neil Hamilton Fairley, an expert on tropical diseases. The outbreak of the Second World War caused <mask> to curtail the North American leg of his tour, and return to Australia in October 1939. Second World War

<mask>, in his role as DGMS, pressed for the construction of major military hospitals in the capital cities. He argued that, after the war, they should be handed over to the Repatriation Commission for the care of

masks: Downes Downes Downes Downes Downes Downes


texts: sick and disabled ex-service personnel.Despite strong opposition on the grounds of cost, <mask> won his case in October 1940. Time soon vindicated his judgement; and today the major military hospitals in the state capital cities, the Concord Repatriation General Hospital in Sydney, the Austin Hospital in Melbourne and Greenslopes Private Hospital in Brisbane remain his greatest legacy. In late 1940, medical units in the Middle East were experienced "precarious and at times acute" shortages of medicals stores. Units were sent to the Middle East as fully equipped as was possible, with the expectation that the British Army would make up the difference, but British policy was that all possible sources had to be exploited before any demands could be made on the United Kingdom's sources. General Sir Thomas Blamey, the Commander in Chief of the AIF, recognised this as something that had to be negotiated between the two governments, but medical officers in the Middle East blamed the Medical Services in Australia—and therefore <mask>—for the situation. The Minister of the Army, Percy Spender decided to pay a visit to the Middle East to see the situation for himself but before he did so, he resolved that <mask> should become Director of Medical Services, AIF (Middle East). On arrival in the Middle East with the Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant General Vernon Sturdee, Spender found that Blamey had already appointed Major General Samuel Burston to that post.This came as a surprise to them as they had not realised that Blamey had the authority to make such an appointment; but on seeing the situation for himself, Spender confirmed Burston's appointment. On

masks: Downes Downes Downes


texts:
 returning to Australia, Spender appointed Major General Frederick Maguire as DGMS and <mask> was appointed to the newly created post of Inspector General of Medical Services (IGMS). As IGMS, <mask> toured extensively—he visited all the Australian states and overseas locations where Australian troops had been sent, including Papua and New Guinea, Malaya, the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia), India and East Africa. When Blamey reorganised the Army on his return to Australia in 1942, he appointed Burston as Director General of Medical Services. <mask> became DMS of the Second Army on 6 April 1942. He joined the Second AIF as a major general on 27 June 1942, receiving the AIF serial number VX57673. Death and legacy
<mask> held this post until 22 August 1944.Due to the run-down of the Army, the Second Army, always mainly a paper organisation, increasingly had less and less to do. Now nearly sixty, he then accepted an invitation to write the medical history series of the official history of Australia in the war. As part of this, in March 1945, he decided to accompany Major General George Alan Vasey to New Guinea, where Vasey's 6th Division had encountered an atabrine-resistant strain of malaria in the Aitape-Wewak campaign. On 5 March 1945, the RAAF Lockheed Hudson aircraft they were travelling in crashed into the sea about  from Machans Beach, just north of the mouth of the Barron River near Cairns. <mask> and Vasey were killed along with all nine other Australian service personnel on board. Their bodies were recovered and buried in Cairns War Cemetery with full military honours. <mask> was survived by Doris,


texts:
 Valerie and Rosemary.A memorial service was held at St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne on 9 March 1945. He became the third most senior Australian officer to die in the Second World War, after General Sir Brudenell White, who died in the Canberra air disaster in 1940, and Lieutenant General Henry Wynter, who died on 7 February 1945. <mask>' papers are in the Australian War Memorial. The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons established the triennial <mask> Memorial Lecture in his honour. The subject of the Lecture is "related to some aspect or aspects of military surgery, medical equipment (military and civil), the surgery of children, neurosurgery, general surgery, medical ethics or medical history; these being subjects in which <mask> was particularly interested". <mask> Memorial Lectures
 1950 Major General Samuel Burston Some Medical Aspects of Atomic Warfare
 1954 A.S. Walker The Following Wind of History
 1957 Major General Frank Kingsley Norris Be Strong and of Good Courage
 1961 Sir Albert Coates The Doctor in the Services
 1965 D. Waterson Œsophageal Replacement in Pædiatric Surgery
 1970 J.H. Louw The Scientific Method in Surgery
 1972 H.E.Beardmore Pædiatric Surgery – Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
 1976 P.P. Rickham Nephroblastoma – a New Look at an Old Problem
 1978 C.M. Gurner Military Medical Preparedness
 1980 D.G. Hamilton One Hundred Years of Pædiatric Surgery in Sydney
 1983 G.B. Ong The Trifacetted Nature of Surgery in Hong Kong
 1988 B.A. Smithurst Distinguished Australian Military Surgeons
 1990 Patricia K. Donahoe The Development of Tumour Inhibitors
 1994 General Sir Phillip Bennett Medical Aspects of

masks:
Downes
Rupert Downes
Downes
Rupert Downes


texts:
 Australia's Defence
 1996 Professor Averil Mansfield Arterio-Venous Malformations and their Treatment
 1998 D. Trunkey I am Giddy, Expectation Whirls me Round
 2000 A. Wyn Beasley Of Scurvy and Shipwreck – the Dutch Discovery of Australasia
 2002 Colonel D. Beard The Music of Warfare
 2005 Robert Pearce Trust me, Claudius
 2008 Professor Arthur Li Ethics and standards
 2011 Major General John Pearn Pro patria et spe gentis
 2014 Air Vice Marshal Hugh Bartholomeusz Tissue reconstruction in war and peace
 2017 Professor Michael Besser The anatomical enlightenment

Source:

Notes

References

1885 births
1945 deaths
People educated at Haileybury (Melbourne)
20th-century Australian historians
Accidental deaths in Queensland
Australian Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George
Australian generals
Australian military doctors
Australian military historians
Australian military personnel of World War I
Australian surgeons
Deaths in tropical cyclones
Fellows of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons
Knights of Grace of the Order of St John
Melbourne Medical School alumni
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1945
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in Australia
Australian Army personnel of World War II
Australian military personnel killed in World War


texts: Dame <mask>  (born 16 October 1925) is an Irish-British actress and singer who has played many film, theater, and television roles. Her career has spanned over 80 years, much of it in the United States; her work has received much international attention as well. Upon the death of Olivia de Havilland in July 2020, <mask> became the earliest surviving Academy Award nominee and one of the last surviving stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood cinema. <mask> was born to an upper-middle-class family in central London, the daughter of Irish actress Moyna Macgill and English politician <mask>. To escape the Blitz, in 1940 she moved to the United States, there studying acting in New York City. Proceeding to Hollywood in 1942, she signed to MGM and obtained her first film roles, in Gaslight (1944) and The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), earning her two Oscar nominations and a Golden Globe Award. She appeared in 11 further MGM films, mostly in minor roles, and after her contract ended in 1952 she began supplementing her cinematic work with theatrical appearances.Although largely seen as a B-list star during this period, her appearance in the film The Manchurian Candidate (1962) received widespread acclaim and is cited as being one of her finer performances. Moving into musical theatre, <mask> finally gained stardom for playing the leading role in the Broadway musical Mame (1966), which earned her her first Tony Award and established her as a gay icon. Amid difficulties in her personal life, <mask> moved from California to County Cork, Ireland in 1970, and continued with a variety of theatrical and cinematic appearances throughout that decade. These included leading

masks:
Angela Brigid Lansbury
Lansbury
Lansbury
Edgar Lansbury
Lansbury
Lansbury


texts:
 roles in the stage musicals Gypsy, Sweeney Todd, and The King and I, as well as in the hit Disney film Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971). Moving into television in 1984, she achieved worldwide fame as fictional writer and sleuth Jessica Fletcher in the American whodunit series Murder, She Wrote, which ran for 12 seasons until 1996, becoming one of the longest-running and most popular detective drama series in television history. Through Corymore Productions, a company that she co-owned with her husband Peter Shaw, <mask> assumed ownership of the series and was its executive producer for the final four seasons. She also moved into voice work, contributing to animated films like Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991) and Don Bluth's Anastasia (1997).Since then, she has toured in a variety of international productions and continued to make occasional film appearances such as Nanny McPhee (2005) and Mary Poppins Returns (2018). <mask> has received an Honorary Academy Award and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the BAFTA and has won five Tony Awards, six Golden Globes, and an Olivier Award. She has also been nominated for numerous other industry awards, including the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress on three occasions, and various Primetime Emmy Awards on 18 occasions, and a Grammy Award. In 2014, <mask> was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II. She has been the subject of three biographies. Early life and childhood
<mask> was born to an upper middle class family on 16 October 1925 in the district of St Pancras in central London. Her birthplace is sometimes given, wrongly, as Poplar, East London.<mask> says she

masks: Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury


texts: has ancestral connections to Poplar but she was born in Regent's Park, Central London. Her mother was Belfast-born actress Moyna Macgill (born Charlotte Lillian McIldowie), who regularly appeared on stage in the West End and who had also starred in several films. Her father was the wealthy English timber merchant and politician <mask>, a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain and former mayor of the Metropolitan Borough of Poplar. Her paternal grandfather was the Labour Party leader and anti-war activist <mask>, a man whom she felt "awed" by and considered "a giant in my youth". <mask> had an older half sister, Isolde, who was the daughter of Moyna's previous marriage to writer and director Reginald Denham. In January 1930, when <mask> was four, her mother gave birth to twin boys, Bruce and Edgar, leading the Lansburys to move from their Poplar flat to a house in Mill Hill, North London; on weekends they would vacate to a rural farm in Berrick Salome, near Wallingford, Oxfordshire. When Lansbury was nine, her father died from stomach cancer; she retreated into playing characters as a coping mechanism.Facing financial difficulty, her mother became engaged to a Scottish colonel, Leckie Forbes, and moved into his house in Hampstead, with Lansbury receiving an education at South Hampstead High School from 1934 until 1939. She nevertheless considered herself largely self-educated, learning from books, theatre and cinema. She became a self-professed "complete movie maniac", visiting the cinema regularly and imagining herself as certain characters. Keen on playing the piano, she briefly studied music at the Ritman School of Dancing, and in 1940 began

masks:
Edgar Lansbury
George Lansbury
Angela
Angela


texts:
 studying acting at the Webber Douglas School of Singing and Dramatic Art in Kensington, West London, first appearing onstage as a lady-in-waiting in the school's production of Maxwell Anderson's Mary of Scotland. That year, <mask>'s grandfather died, and with the onset of the Blitz, Macgill decided to take <mask>, Bruce and Edgar to the United States; Isolde remained in Britain with her new husband, the actor Peter Ustinov. Macgill secured a job supervising 60 British children who were being evacuated to North America aboard the Duchess of Atholl, arriving with them in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in mid-August. From there, she proceeded by train to New York City, where she was financially sponsored by a Wall Street businessman, Charles T. Smith, moving in with his family at their home at Mahopac, New York.Lansbury gained a scholarship from the American Theatre Wing allowing her to study at the Feagin School of Drama and Radio, where she appeared in performances of William Congreve's The Way of the World and Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan. She graduated in March 1942, by which time the family had moved to a flat in Morton Street, Greenwich Village. Acting career

Film

Career beginnings and breakthrough (1940–50)
Macgill secured work in a Canadian touring production of Tonight at 8.30, and was joined in Canada by her daughter, who gained her first theatrical job as a nightclub act at the Samovar Club, Montreal. Having gained the job by claiming to be 19 when she was 16, her act consisted of her singing songs by Noël Coward, and earned her $60 a week. She returned to New York City in August 1942, but her mother had moved to Hollywood, Los Angeles, in

masks: Angela Angela


texts: order to resurrect her cinematic career; Lansbury and her brothers followed. Moving into a bungalow in Laurel Canyon, both Lansbury and her mother obtained Christmas jobs at the Bullocks Wilshire department store in Los Angeles; Moyna was sacked for incompetence, leaving the family to subsist on Lansbury's wages of $28 a week. Befriending a group of gay men, Lansbury became privy to the city's underground gay scene, and with her mother, attended lectures by the spiritual guru Jiddu Krishnamurti; at one of these, she met Aldous Huxley.At a party hosted by her mother, <mask> met John van Druten, who had recently co-authored a script for Gaslight (1944), a mystery-thriller based on Patrick Hamilton's 1938 play Gaslight. Set in Victorian London, the film was being directed by George Cukor, and starred Ingrid Bergman in the lead role of Paula Alquist, a woman being psychologically tormented by her husband. Van Druten suggested that <mask> would be perfect for the role of Nancy Oliver, a conniving cockney maid; she was accepted for the part, although, since she was only 17, a social worker had to accompany her on the set. Obtaining an agent, Earl Kramer, she was signed to a seven-year contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, earning $500 a week and using her real name as her professional name. Already her casting received attention, with Variety magazine in August 1943 claiming Lansbury to have gone from unknown to movie star in just four days. Upon release, Gaslight received mixed critical reviews, although Lansbury's role was widely praised; the film earned six Academy Award nominations, including one for Best Supporting Actress for Lansbury. Her next film

masks: Lansbury Lansbury


texts: appearance was as Edwina Brown, the older sister of Velvet Brown in National Velvet (1944); the film proved to be a major commercial hit, with Lansbury developing a lifelong friendship with co-star Elizabeth Taylor.<mask> next starred in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), a cinematic adaptation of Oscar Wilde's 1890 novel of the same name, which was again set in Victorian London. Directed by Albert Lewin, <mask> was cast as Sibyl Vane, a working-class music hall singer who falls in love with the protagonist, Dorian Gray (Hurd Hatfield). Although the film was not a financial success, <mask>'s performance once more drew praise, earning her a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture, and she was again nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the Academy Awards, losing to Anne Revere, her co-star in National Velvet. On September 27, 1945, <mask> married Richard Cromwell, an artist and decorator whose acting career had come to a standstill. Their marriage was troubled; Cromwell was gay, and had married <mask> in the unsuccessful hope that doing so would turn him heterosexual. The marriage ended in less than a year when she filed for divorce on September 11, 1946, but they remained friends until his death. In December 1946, she was introduced to fellow English expatriate Peter Pullen Shaw at a party held by former co-star Hurd Hatfield in Ojai Valley.Shaw was an aspiring actor, also signed to MGM, and had recently left a relationship with Joan Crawford. He and <mask> became a couple, living together before she proposed marriage. The couple were intent on getting married back in Britain, but the Church of England refused to marry two

masks: Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury


texts:
 divorcees. Instead, they wed in a Church of Scotland ceremony at St. Columba's Church in Knightsbridge, London in August 1949, followed by a honeymoon in France. Returning to the U.S., where they settled into <mask>'s home in Rustic Canyon, Malibu, in 1951 both became naturalised U.S. citizens and retained their British citizenship via dual nationality. Established character actress (1950–60)
Following the success of Gaslight and The Picture of Dorian Gray, MGM cast <mask> in 11 further films until her contract with the company ended in 1952. Keeping her among their B-list stars, MGM used her less than their similar-aged actresses; biographers Edelman and Kupferberg believed that the majority of these films were "mediocre", doing little to further her career.This view was echoed by Cukor, who believed <mask> had been "consistently miscast" by MGM. She was repeatedly made to portray older women, often villainous, and as a result became increasingly dissatisfied with working for MGM, commenting that "I kept wanting to play the Jean Arthur roles, and Mr Mayer kept casting me as a series of venal bitches." The company themselves were suffering from the post-1948 slump in cinema sales, as a result slashing film budgets and cutting their number of staff. Lansbury played her first American character as "Em", a tough honky-tonk saloon singer who slaps Judy Garland's character in the Oscar-winning Wild West musical The Harvey Girls (1946). She appeared in The Hoodlum Saint (also 1946), Till the Clouds Roll By (1947), If Winter Comes (1947), Tenth Avenue Angel (1948), The Three Musketeers (1948), State of the Union (1948) and The Red Danube (1949). She was loaned

masks: Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury


texts: by MGM first to United Artists for The Private Affairs of Bel Ami (1947), and then to Paramount for Samson and Delilah (1949). She appeared as a villainous maidservant in Kind Lady (1951) and a French adventuress in Mutiny (1952).Turning to radio, in 1948 she appeared in an audio adaptation of Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage for NBC University Theatre and the following year she starred in their adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Moving into television, she appeared in a 1950 episode of Robert Montgomery Presents adapted from A.J. Cronin's The Citadel. Unhappy with the roles she was being given by MGM, <mask> instructed her manager, Harry Friedman of MCA Inc., to terminate her contract in 1952, in the same year that her son Anthony was born. Soon after the birth, she joined the East Coast touring productions of two former-Broadway plays: Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse's Remains to Be Seen and Louis Verneuil's Affairs of State. Biographer Margaret Bonanno later stated that at this point, Lansbury's career had "hit an all-time low". In April 1953, her daughter Deirdre <mask> was born.Shaw had a son by a previous marriage, David, and after gaining legal custody of the boy in 1953, brought him to California to live with the family; with three children to raise, the Shaws moved to a larger house on San Vincente Boulevard in Santa Monica, California. However, Lansbury did not feel entirely comfortable in the Hollywood social scene, later asserting that as a result of her British roots, "in Hollywood, I always felt like a stranger in a strange land." In 1959, the family moved to Malibu, settling into a house on the Pacific Coast Highway that

masks:
Lansbury
Angela Shaw


texts:
 had been designed by Aaron Green; there, she and Peter escaped the Hollywood scene, and were able to send their children to a local public school. Returning to cinema as a freelance actress, Lansbury found herself typecast as women older (sometimes far older) than herself in many films in which she appeared during this period. As she later stated, "Hollywood made me old before my time," noting that in her 20s she was receiving fan mail from people who believed her to be in her 40s. She obtained minor roles in the  films A Life at Stake (1954), A Lawless Street (1955) and The Purple Mask (1955), later describing the last as "the worst movie I ever made". She played Princess Gwendolyn in the comedy film The Court Jester (1956), then took the role of a wife who kills her husband in Please Murder Me (1956).She appeared as Minnie Littlejohn in The Long Hot Summer (1958), and as Mabel Claremont in The Reluctant Debutante (1958), which she filmed in Paris. Biographer Martin Gottfried said that it was these latter two cinematic appearances which restored <mask>'s status as an "A-picture actress". Throughout this period, she continued making appearances on television, starring in episodes of Revlon Mirror Theatre, Ford Theatre and The George Gobel Show, and became a regular on game show Pantomime Quiz. Independent films and further acclaim (1960–80)
<mask>'s rare sympathetic role as Mavis in The Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960) drew critical acclaim, as did her performances as sinister characters in All Fall Down (1962), as a manipulative, destructive mother,  and the Cold War thriller The Manchurian Candidate (1962) as the scheming ideologue Mrs. Iselin. In


texts: the latter, she was cast for the role by John Frankenheimer based on her performance in All Fall Down. Lansbury was only three years older than actor Laurence Harvey who played her son in the film. She had agreed to appear in the film after reading the original novel, describing it as "one of the most exciting political books I ever read".Biographers Edelman and Kupferberg considered this role "her enduring cinematic triumph", while Gottfried stated that it was "the strongest, the most memorable and the best picture she ever made ... she gives her finest film performance in it." <mask> received her third Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nomination for the film, and was bothered by the fact that she lost, losing to Patty Duke for The Miracle Worker (1962). <mask> followed this with a performance as Sybil Logan in In the Cool of the Day (1963), a film she renounced as awful, and appeared as wealthy Isabel Boyd in The World of Henry Orient (1964) and the widow Phyllis in Dear Heart (1964). <mask> declined several cinematic roles, including the lead in The Killing of Sister George (1968) and the role of Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975). Instead, she accepted the role of the Countess von Ornstein, an aging German aristocrat who falls in love with a younger man, in Something for Everyone (1970), for which she filmed on location in Hohenschwangen, Bavaria. The same year, she appeared as the middle-aged English witch Eglantine Price in the Disney film Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971); this was her first lead in a screen musical, and led to her publicising the film on television programmes like the David Frost Show. She later noted that


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 as a big commercial hit, this film "secured an enormous audience for me".<mask> spent most of the 1970s on stage rather than on screen, but was acclaimed for her supporting performance in 1978's Death on the Nile, which Johnny Depp cited as one of his inspirations for his portrayal of Ichabod Crane in Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow. <mask> appeared as Miss Froy in The Lady Vanishes (1979), a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's earlier film released in 1938. The following year's The Mirror Crack'd featured her in another film based on an Agatha Christie novel, this time as Miss Marple, a sleuth in 1950s Kent. <mask> hoped to get away from the depiction of the role by Margaret Rutherford, instead returning to Christie's description of the character; in this she created a precursor to her later role of Jessica Fletcher. She was signed to appear in two sequels as Miss Marple, but these never were made. <mask>'s next film was the animated The Last Unicorn (1982), for which she provided the voice of the witch Mommy Fortuna. Beauty and the Beast and other roles (1990–2000)
Throughout the run of Murder, She Wrote, Lansbury had continued making appearances in other television films, miniseries and cinema.In 1986, she co-hosted the New York Philharmonic's televised tribute to the centenary of the Statue of Liberty with Kirk Douglas. She appeared as the protagonist's mother in Rage of Angels: The Story Continues (1986)  and portrayed Nan Moore – the mother of a victim of the real-life Korean Air Lines Flight 007 plane crash – in Shootdown (1988); being a mother herself, she had been "enormously touched by the incident". She was featured in The Shell Seekers (1989) as an

masks: Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury


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 Englishwoman recuperating from a heart attack, and starred in The Love She Sought (1990) as an American school teacher who falls in love with a Catholic priest while visiting Ireland; Lansbury thought it "a marvelous woman's story". She next starred as the Cockney Mrs Harris in a film adaptation of the novel Mrs 'Arris Goes to Paris (1992), which was directed by her son and executive produced by her stepson. Her highest profile cinematic role since The Manchurian Candidate was as the voice of the motherly teapot Mrs. Potts in the Disney animation Beauty and the Beast (1991), an appearance that she considered to be a gift to her three grandchildren. Lansbury performed the title song to the film, which won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song and Grammy Award for Best Song Written for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media. In 2021, <mask> made a surprise appearance referencing her role as Mrs. Potts on the audio guide of "Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts", The Metropolitan Museum of Art's first ever exhibition about Walt Disney and his Studios.Return to film (2005–19)
She starred in the film Nanny McPhee (2005) as Aunt Adelaide, later informing an interviewer that working on Nanny McPhee "pulled me out of the abyss" after the loss of her husband. She then appeared in the film Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), opposite Jim Carrey. In 2012, it was announced that <mask> was set to star in Wes Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel; however, she had to back out of the project (with Tilda Swinton replacing her) due to prior scheduling conflicts with the Australian production of


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 Driving Miss Daisy, in which she co-starred alongside James Earl Jones. In November 2013, she received an Academy Honorary Award for her lifetime achievement at the Governors Awards which was presented to her by Robert Osborne of Turner Classic Movies. Emma Thompson and Geoffrey Rush also offered tributes. She also appeared in a supporting role in Mary Poppins Returns (2018), a sequel to the 1964 original film, set 20 years later in Depression-era London which features Emily Blunt as the title character. Filming began at Shepperton Studios in February 2017, and the film was released in December 2018 to positive reviews.In January 2019, Lansbury was invited to the American Film Institute's luncheon to give the annual benediction where she talked about her experiences at MGM, the craft of acting and the importance of a film community. The appearance was a surprise to the group of film and television stars who gave her a standing ovation. Lansbury concluded her remarks by giving advice to the possible Oscar, and Golden Globe contenders about the awards season stating "As you leave here today and are invited to endure a seemingly endless parade of programs that label you a 'winner' or a 'loser' – I've been there, I've done that, remember this room, when we are all together as one." Theatre

Career beginnings and breakthrough (1957–61)
In April 1957, she debuted on Broadway at the Henry Miller Theatre in Hotel Paradiso, a French burlesque set in Paris, directed by Peter Glenville. The play only ran for 15 weeks, although she earned good reviews for her role as "Marcel Cat". She later stated that had she not appeared in the play, her "whole career would have


texts: fizzled out"/ She followed this with an appearance in 1960s Broadway performance of A Taste of Honey at the Lyceum Theatre, directed by Tony Richardson and George Devine. Lansbury played Helen, the boorish, verbally abusive, otherwise absentee mother of Josephine (played by Joan Plowright, only four years Lansbury's junior), remarking that she gained "a great deal of satisfaction" from the role.During the show's run, <mask> developed a friendship with Plowright, as well as with Plowright's lover and future husband, Laurence Olivier. It was from <mask>'s rented flat on East 97th Street that Plowright and Olivier eloped to be married. After a well-reviewed appearance in Summer of the Seventeenth Doll (1959) – for which she had filmed in Sydney, Australia – and a minor role in A Breath of Scandal (1960), she appeared in 1961's Blue Hawaii as an overbearing mother, whose son was played by Elvis Presley, despite his being her junior by only nine years. Acknowledging that the film was of poor quality, she commented that she agreed to appear in it because "I was desperate." Her first appearance in a theatrical musical was the short-lived Anyone Can Whistle, written by Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim. An experimental work, it opened at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway in April 1964, but was critically panned and closed after nine performances. <mask> had played the role of crooked mayoress Cora Hoover Hooper, and although she loved Sondheim's score she faced personal differences with Laurents and was glad when the show closed.In 1965, she appeared in a second-season episode of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. as a flamboyant and wealthy actress. She appeared in The


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 Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), a cinematic biopic of Jesus, but was cut almost entirely from the final edit. She followed this with an appearance as Mama Jean Bello in Harlow (1965), as Lady Blystone in The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (1965), and as Gloria in Mister Buddwing (1966). Despite her well-received performances in a number of films, "celluloid superstardom" evaded her, and she became increasingly dissatisfied with these minor roles, feeling that none allowed her to explore her potential as an actress. Returning to musical cinema, she starred as Ruth in The Pirates of Penzance (1983), a film based on Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera of the same name, and while filming it in London sang on a recording of The Beggar's Opera as a mezzo-soprano. This was followed by an appearance as the grandmother in the gothic fantasy film The Company of Wolves (1984).Lansbury had also begun work for television, appearing in a television film with Bette Davis titled Little Gloria... Happy at Last (1982). She followed this with an appearance in The Gift of Love: A Christmas Story (1983), later describing it as "the most unsophisticated thing you can imagine". In the television film A Talent for Murder (1984), she played a wheelchair using mystery writer; although describing it as "a rush job", she agreed to do it in order to work with co-star Laurence Olivier. Two further miniseries featuring Lansbury appeared in 1984: Lace and The First Olympics: Athens 1896. Broadway stardom (1966–80)

In 1966, Lansbury took on the title role of Mame Dennis in the musical Mame, Jerry Herman's musical adaptation of the novel Auntie Mame. The director's first choice for


texts: the role had been Rosalind Russell, who played Mame in the non-musical film adaptation Auntie Mame, but she had declined.Lansbury actively sought the role in the hope that it would mark a change in her career. When she was chosen, it came as a surprise to theatre critics, who believed that it would go to a better-known actress; Lansbury was forty-one years old, and it was her first starring role. Mame Dennis was a glamorous character, with over twenty costume changes throughout the play, and Lansbury's role involved ten songs and dance routines which she trained extensively for. First appearing in Philadelphia and then Boston, Mame opened at the Winter Garden Theatre on Broadway in May 1966. Auntie Mame was already popular among the gay community, and Mame gained Lansbury a cult gay following, something that she later attributed to the fact that Mame Dennis was "every gay person's idea of glamour ... Everything about Mame coincided with every young man's idea of beauty and glory and it was lovely." Reviews of Lansbury's performance were overwhelmingly positive. In The New York Times, Stanley Kauffmann wrote: "Miss Lansbury is a singing-dancing actress, not a singer or dancer who also acts ...In this marathon role she has wit, poise, warmth and a very taking coolth." The role resulted in <mask> receiving her first Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical. Lansbury's later biographer Margaret Bonanno claimed that Mame made <mask> a "superstar", with the actress herself commenting on her success by stating that "Everyone loves you, everyone loves the success, and enjoys it as much as you do. And it lasts as long as you are on that stage and as long


texts: as you keep coming out of that stage door." The stardom achieved through Mame allowed <mask> to make further appearances on television, such as on Perry Como's Thanksgiving special in November 1966. Her fame also allowed her to engage in a variety of high-profile charitable endeavors, for instance appearing as the guest of honor at the 1967 March of Dimes annual benefit luncheon. She was invited to star in a musical performance for the 1968 Academy Awards ceremony, and co-hosted that year's Tony Awards with former brother-in-law Peter Ustinov.That year, Harvard University's Hasty Pudding Club elected her "Woman of the Year". When the film adaptation of Mame was put into production, <mask> hoped to be offered the part, but it instead went to Lucille Ball, an established box-office success. <mask> considered this to be "one of my bitterest disappointments". Her personal life was complicated when she learned that both of her children had become involved with the counterculture of the 1960s and had been using recreational drugs; as a result, Anthony had become addicted to cocaine and heroin. <mask> followed the success of Mame with a performance as Countess Aurelia, the 75-year-old Parisian eccentric in Dear World, a musical adaptation of Jean Giraudoux's The Madwoman of Chaillot. The show opened at Broadway's Mark Hellinger Theatre in February 1969, but <mask> found it a "pretty depressing" experience. Reviews of her performance were positive, and she was awarded her second Tony Award on the basis of it.Reviews of the show more generally were critical, however, and it ended after 132 performances. She followed this with an appearance in the title role of the


texts: musical Prettybelle, which was based upon Jean Arnold's The Rape of Prettybelle. Set in the Deep South, it dealt with issues of racism, with <mask> as a wealthy alcoholic who seeks sexual encounters with black men. A controversial play, it opened in Boston but received poor reviews, being cancelled before it reached Broadway. <mask> later described the play as "a complete and utter fiasco", admitting that in her opinion, her "performance was awful". The year 1970 was traumatic for the <mask> family, as Peter underwent a hip replacement, Anthony suffered a heroin overdose and entered a coma, and in September, the family's Malibu home was destroyed in a brush fire. They then purchased Knockmourne Glebe, a farmhouse constructed in the 1820s which was located near the village of Conna in rural County Cork, and, after Anthony quit using cocaine and heroin, took him there to recover from his drug addiction.To help her children out, the family had moved to Ireland. <mask> didn't work for a whole year so she could be there for Anthony and Deidre while they were recovering from their addiction. He enrolled in the Webber-Douglas School, his mother's alma mater, and became a professional actor, then moved into television directing. <mask> and her husband did not return to California, instead dividing their time between County Cork and New York City. In 1972, <mask> returned to London's West End to perform in the Royal Shakespeare Company's theatrical production of Edward Albee's All Over at the Aldwych Theatre. She portrayed the mistress of a dying New England millionaire, and although the play's reviews were mixed, Lansbury's acting was widely praised. This was


texts: followed by her reluctant involvement in a revival of Mame, which was then touring the United States, after which she returned to the West End to play the character of Rose in the musical Gypsy.She had initially turned down the role, not wishing to be in the shadow of Ethel Merman, who had portrayed the character in the original Broadway production, but eventually accepted it; when the show started in May 1973, she earned a standing ovation and rave reviews. Settling into a Belgravia flat, she was soon in demand among London society, having dinners held in her honour. Following the culmination of the London run, in 1974 Gypsy went on a tour of the U.S., and in Chicago <mask> was awarded the Sarah Siddons Award for her performance. The show eventually reached Broadway, where it ran until January 1975; a critical success, it earned <mask> her third Tony Award. After several months' break, Gypsy then toured throughout the country again in the summer of 1975. Desiring to move on from musicals, Lansbury decided that she wanted to appear in a production of one of William Shakespeare's plays. She obtained the role of Gertrude in the National Theatre Company's production of Hamlet, staged at the Old Vic.Directed by Peter Hall, the production ran from December 1975 to May 1976, receiving mixed reviews; <mask> later commented that she "hated" the role, believing it too restrained. Her mood was worsened by the news that in November 1975 her mother had died in California; <mask> had her mother's body cremated and the ashes scattered near her own County Cork home. Her next theatrical appearance was in two one-act plays by Edward Albee, Counting the Ways and Listening,


texts: performed side by side at the Hartford Stage Company in Connecticut. Reviews of the production were mixed, but <mask> was again singled out for praise. This was followed by another revival tour of Gypsy. In April 1978, <mask> appeared in 24 performances of a revival of The King and I musical staged at Broadway's Uris Theatre; <mask> played the role of Mrs Anna, replacing Constance Towers, who was on a short break. Her first cinematic role in seven years was as novelist and murder victim Salome Otterbourne in  Death on the Nile (1978), an adaptation of Agatha Christie's 1937 novel of the same name that was filmed in both London and Egypt.In the film, <mask> starred alongside Peter Ustinov and Bette Davis, who became a close friend. The role earned <mask> the National Board of Review award for Best Supporting Actress of 1978. In March 1979, Lansbury first appeared as Nellie Lovett in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, a Stephen Sondheim musical directed by Harold Prince. Opening at the Uris Theatre on Broadway, she starred alongside Len Cariou as Sweeney Todd, the murderous barber in 19th century London. After being offered the role, she jumped on the opportunity due to the involvement of Sondheim in the project; she commented that she loved "the extraordinary wit and intelligence of his lyrics". She remained in the role for fourteen months before being replaced by Dorothy Loudon; the musical received mixed critical reviews, although it earned <mask> her fourth Tony Award and After Dark magazine's Ruby Award for Broadway Performer of the Year. She returned to the role in October 1980 for a ten-month tour of six U.S. cities, with George Hearn


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 playing the title character; the production was also filmed and broadcast on the Entertainment Channel.In 1982, she took on the role of an upper middle class housewife who champions workers' rights in A Little Family Business, a farce set in Baltimore in which her son Anthony also starred. It debuted at Los Angeles' Ahmanson Theatre before heading on to Broadway's Martin Beck Theatre. It was critically panned and induced accusations of racism from the Japanese-American community. That year, <mask> was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame, and the following year appeared in a Mame revival at Broadway's Gershwin Theatre. Although <mask> was praised, the show was a commercial flop, with <mask> noting that "I realised that it's not a show of today. It's a period piece." Return to Broadway (2001–09)

Following the end of Murder, She Wrote, <mask> returned to the theatre.Although cast in the lead role in the 2001 Kander and Ebb musical The Visit, she withdrew before it opened due to her husband's deteriorating health. Peter died in January 2003 of congestive heart failure at the couple's home in Brentwood, California. <mask> felt that after this event she would not take on any more major acting roles, and that instead might make a few cameos but nothing more. Wanting to spend more time in New York City, in 2006 she purchased a $2 million condominium in Manhattan. <mask> returned to Broadway after a 23-year absence in Deuce, a play by Terrence McNally that opened at the Music Box Theatre in May 2007 for a limited run of eighteen weeks. <mask> received a Tony Award nomination for Best Leading Actress in a Play for her role. In March 2009 she returned

masks: Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury Lansbury


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 to Broadway for a revival of Blithe Spirit at the Shubert Theatre, where she took on the role of Madame Arcati.This appearance earned her the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play; this was her fifth Tony Award, tying her with the previous record holder for the number of Tony Awards, Julie Harris, albeit all of Harris' Tonys were for Best Leading Actress. From December 2009 to June 2010, Lansbury then starred as Madame Armfeldt alongside Catherine Zeta-Jones in the first Broadway revival of A Little Night Music, held at the Walter Kerr Theatre. The role earned her a seventh Tony Award nomination, while in May 2010, she was awarded an honorary doctoral degree from Manhattan School of Music. Return to the West End (2012–19)

From April to July 2012, <mask> starred as women's rights advocate Sue-Ellen Gamadge in the Broadway revival of Gore Vidal's The Best Man at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre. From February to June 2013, Lansbury starred alongside James Earl Jones in an Australian tour of Driving Miss Daisy. From March to June 2014, Lansbury reprised her performance as Madame Arcati in Blithe Spirit at the Gielgud Theatre in London's West End, her first London stage appearance in nearly 40 years. While in London, she made an appearance at the Angela Lansbury Film Festival in Poplar, a screening of some of her best known films organised by Poplar Film.From December 2014 to March 2015, she joined the tour of Blithe Spirit across North America. In April 2015, aged 89, she received her first Olivier Award as Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Arcati, and in November 2015 was awarded the Oscar Hammerstein Award for Lifetime Achievement in


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 Musical Theatre. On June 2, 2016, it was officially announced that <mask> would return to Broadway in the 2017–2018 season in a revival of Enid Bagnold's 1955 play The Chalk Garden. The play was produced by Scott Rudin at a theatre to-be-announced. However, in an interview published on September 20, 2016, Lansbury stated that she will not be performing in The Chalk Garden, saying: "At my time of life, I've decided that I want to be with family more and being alone in New York doing a play requires an extraordinary amount of time left alone." On November 18, 2019, <mask> returned to Broadway portraying Lady Bracknell in a one-night benefit staging of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest for Roundabout Theatre Company's American Airlines Theatre. In October 2020, Variety magazine considered her career to "defy all logic" and continued "Though powerful women were sometimes maligned, it was thought you needed to be heartless to survive in showbiz, Lansbury has created a 77-year career and nobody has a bad word to say about her."Television

Murder, She Wrote (1984–96)

In 1983, <mask> was offered two main television roles, one in a Norman Lear sitcom opposite Charles Durning and the other in a detective series by co-creators William Link and Richard Levinson of Columbo fame. Unable to do both, she chose to do the detective series despite the fact her agents had advised her to accept the sitcom. The series Murder, She Wrote centered on the character of Jessica Fletcher, a retired school teacher from the fictional town of Cabot Cove, Maine, who became a successful detective novelist after her husband's death, also solving murders encountered during her


texts: travels. <mask> described the character as "an American Miss Marple". The series was created by Peter S. Fischer, Richard Levinson and William Link, who had earlier had success with Columbo and the role of Jessica Fletcher had been first offered to Jean Stapleton, who declined the role, as did Doris Day. The pilot episode "The Murder of Sherlock Holmes" premiered on on September 30, 1984, with the rest of the first season airing on Sundays from 8 to 9 p.m. Although critical reviews were mixed, it proved highly popular, with the pilot having a Nielsen rating of 18.9 and the first season being rated top in its time slot.Designed as inoffensive family viewing, despite its topic the show eschewed depicting violence or gore, following the "whodunit" format rather than those of most contemporary U.S. crime shows; <mask> herself commented that "best of all, there's no violence. I hate violence." <mask> was protective of Jessica Fletcher, having creative input over the character's costumes, makeup and hair and rejecting pressure from network executives to put her in a relationship, believing that the character should remain a strong single female. When she believed that a scriptwriter had made Jessica do or say things that did not fit with the character's personality, <mask> ensured that the script was changed. She saw Jessica as a role model for older female viewers, praising her "enormous, universal appeal – that was an accomplishment I never expected in my entire life." Lansbury biographers Rob Edelman and Audrey E. Kupferberg described the series as "a television landmark" in the U.S. for having an older female character as the protagonist, thereby paving the


texts: way for later series like The Golden Girls. Lansbury herself noted that "I think it's the first time a show has really been aimed at the middle aged audience," and although it was most popular among senior citizens, it gradually gained a younger audience.By 1991, one third of viewers were under age 50. It gained continually high ratings throughout most of its run, outdoing rivals in its time slot such as Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stories. In February 1987, a spin-off was produced, The Law & Harry McGraw, although it was short-lived. As the show's run continued, Lansbury assumed a larger role behind the scenes. In 1989, her company Corymore Productions began co-producing the show with Universal. Nevertheless, she began to tire of the series and in particular the long working hours, stating that the 1990–91 season would be the show's last. She changed her mind after being appointed executive producer for the 1992–93 season, something that she felt "made it far more interesting to me".For the 8th season, the show's setting moved to New York City, where Jessica had taken a job teaching criminology at Manhattan University. The move was an attempt to attract younger viewers and was encouraged by <mask>. Having become a "Sunday-night institution" in the U.S., the show's ratings improved during the early 1990s, becoming a Top Five programme. However, CBS executives, hoping to gain a larger audience, moved it to Thursdays at 8pm, opposite NBC's sitcom Friends. <mask> was angry at the move, believing that it ignored the show's core audience. The final episode of the series aired in May 1996, and ended with <mask> voicing a "Goodbye from Jessica" message at the