Bruce Lansbury Movies

This fourth TV movie inspired by the classic, long-running mystery series Murder, She Wrote is also the first based on a novel, namely Lyn Hamilton's The Celtic Riddle. Angela Lansbury recreates her role as mystery writer-cum-amateur sleuth Jessica B. Fletcher, who on this occasion has journeyed to Ireland, there to attend the reading of the will of an old friend. Naturally, the bequeathing is chock-full of bizarre conditions and codicils, but the reading itself takes second place to the series of murders which follow. The police do their usual "thorough" investigation and come up with nothing, leaving it to Jessica to assemble the clues, many of which are maddeningly cryptic, and all of which are somehow linked to a huge hidden treasure. Filmed on location, Murder, She Wrote: The Celtic Riddle first aired May 9, 2003, on CBS. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

During her annual visit to Ireland, Jessica (Angela Lansbury) enjoys the hospitality of a fishing lodge near Kilcleer. Coinciding with Jessica's stay is the arrival of a consortium which wants to buy the lodge in order to begin strip-mining the property. Before long, the lodge's owner, Tom Dempsey (Rod Taylor) is under suspicion for the death of a tourist found floating in a local wishing well. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A murder has been committed in Cabot Cove, and the body is found in the garage of Jessica Fletcher (Angela Lansbury). Actually, two murders take place, and the cause of it all is the illicit affair between a married woman and the town bully. All the members of the couple's bowling league are suspected, but Jessica deduces that it took only one person to score the two strikes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This story revolves around piano prodigy Leslie Walden (Jenny Lewis) and her demanding mentor Byron (Ronald Guttman). Believing that Leslie would be nothing without him, Byron bristles at the likelihood that he is losing control of the girl's career. Soon afterward, Byron is found murdered--and it is up to Jessica (Angela Lansbury) to perform a few arpeggios and glissandos (metaphorically speaking, of course) to determine the killer's identity. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Former jewel thief turned insurance investigator Dennis Stanton (Keith Michell) has changed professions once more, and is now chief of security on a cruise ship. When a woman is found dead in the ship's cargo section, it soon develops that virtually everyone on board is either a thief or a liar--not to mention a potential murderer. The only passenger whom Dennis can trust is his old friend Jessica (Angela Lansbury), who of course agrees to help him solve the case. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The final episode of Murder, She Wrote's eighth season finds Jessica (Angela Lansbury) at the headquarters of a profitable toy company, there to supervise the design of a new board game based on her own mystery novels. Within what seems like minutes, the company's ruthless vice-president Meredith Delaney (Barbara Babcock) is murdered. Now Jessica finds herself in a real-life variation of her board game as she sifts through the suspects, which include the dead woman's husband, her much-younger lover, and an embittered designer. This episode is something of a family affair for star Angela Lansbury: it was written by her brother Bruce Lansbury, and features her nephew David Lansbury in a supporting role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Now it's off to Monte Carlo, where Jessica (Angela Lansbury) pays a visit to her old friend, the owner of a luxury hotel.. Unfortunately, the hotel proves to be the final destination for a much-despised businessman. In her efforts to solve this murder and recover a diamond stolen from the victim's wife, Jessica forms an alliance with the relentlessly charming police inspector Charles Morel (Patrick Bachau). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this detective drama, two gumshoes are engaged by a millionaire father who wants to find his daughter who has been kidnapped. The film is also known as Love For Ransom. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Disregarding an unsold pilot film starring Cathy Lee Crosby as the title character, William Moulton Marston's celebrated comic-book superheroine Wonder Woman made her TV bow in the formidable person of Lynda Carter. Introduced on November 7, 1975, with the two-hour opener The New Original Wonder Woman, the ABC fantasy adventure series began its semi-weekly run on April 21, 1976. Initially set during the WWII years, the series chronicled the adventures of a legendary Amazonian princess who hailed from Paradise Island, where her forebears had fled from male persecution back in the third century B.C. Like the other female residents of Paradise Island, Wonder Woman had powers far beyond those of ordinary women, and was decked out with gold bracelets and a golden belt containing the miracle metal Feminum, enabling her to deflect bullets with her wrists. She also possessed a golden lasso with which she "wrangled" various villains. Assuming the "mortal" identity of Diana Prince, Wonder Woman joined the U.S. army air corps as a yeoman, the better to be near handsome pilot Major Steve Trevor (Lyle Waggoner), whom she'd met when his plane crash-landed on Paradise Island. Since "Diana" wore glasses and dressed more modestly than her "real" self, Steve never quite caught on that she and Wonder Woman were one in the same. Most of the first-season episodes found Diana Prince helping Steve battle Nazi spies and saboteurs, with our heroine transforming herself into Wonder Woman by twirling around and around at super speed. These early episodes also featured Wonder Woman's younger sister Drusilla (aka Wonder Girl), played by no less than Debra Winger; also, Beatrice Cohen appeared as Corporal Etta Candy, Diana's best friend.

When Wonder Woman moved from ABC to CBS for its second season, quite a few changes were imposed upon its format. First, the title was altered to The New Adventures of Wonder Woman. Second, the series' time frame was moved up from the 1940s to the 1970s, with Diana/Wonder Woman fighting contemporary baddies on behalf of the IADC (Inter-Agency Defense Command), headed by Joe Atkinson (Norman Burton). Finally, Steve Trevor was replaced by his lookalike son (and W.W.'s immediate superior), Steve Trevor Jr. (played again by Lyle Waggoner), who because Wonder Woman was "immortal" appeared to be the same age as the heroine -- or, more accurately, she appeared to be the same age as he. Other additions to the property included IADC's all-purpose computer I.R.A. (voiced by Tom Kratochzil) and Steve Jr.'s secretary, Eve (Saundra Sharp). In this revised form, The New Adventures of Wonder Woman survived on CBS until September 11, 1979. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This made-for-television feature (which premiered on the ABC Movie Of The Week) attracted slightly more interest than usual, due in part to the presence an unusually recognizable supporting cast (including several players, such as Joseph Cotten, Keenan Wynn and Dewey Martin, who'd had real film careers, going back to the 1940's), and Star Trek's Leonard Nimoy in the lead. Nimoy plays Commander Phil Kettenring, the captain of the nuclear submarine Wayne, which has been assigned a critical, top-secret mission involving a less than completely cooperative scientist (Malachi Throne). What Kettenring doesn't know is that the Eastern bloc enemy (this being the middle of the Cold War) is already on to the mission. They've not only got a fairly clever trap set for the sub in mid-ocean, but have also infiltrated the crew at key points. As the Wayne's and her commander's problems mount, the crew begins to lose confidence in Kettenring, threatening not only the mission, but the safety of the sub. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Season five of Mission: Impossible finds only two of the series' original regulars still in the cast: Greg Morris as the IMF team's electronics genius Barney Collier and Peter Lupus as muscle man Willie Armitage. Peter Graves, cast as IMF leader Jim Phelps, had been with the series since season two, when he'd been brought in as a replacement for Steven Hill; and Leonard Nimoy was entering his second -- and as it turned out, his last -- season in the role of magician and master of disguise Paris, a character created to fill the gap left by the defection of former regular Martin Landau. Although the producers had not found a suitable replacement for another ex-regular, Barbara Bain, during season four, they obviously felt they'd solved this problem in the fifth season with the hiring of Lesley Ann Warren as new IMFer Dana Lambert. Like Bain's character Cinnamon Carter, Dana was a bit of a femme fatale, albeit more on the vulnerable side; and also like Cinnamon, Dana could impersonate a wide variety of familiar female "types," from wide-eyed ingenue to worldly courtesan. Alas, despite her talent, beauty and versatility, Warren was unable to supplant Barbara Bain in the hearts and minds of the series' fans, and by the end of season five she too had left the show. Another addition to the cast this season is Sam Elliott as Dr. Doug Lane, who is from time to time brought into the IMF's various counterespionage and infiltration schemes because of his medical knowhow and his understanding of the criminal psyche. Although Dr. Doug Lane was also dropped from the show at season's end, he would make an unexpected return appearance in the sixth-season episode "Encore." Suffering from progressively diminishing ratings since the departure of Martin Landau and Barbara Bain, Mission: Impossible continued to be plagued by viewer drop-off during season six, even though it had moved to a "safe" Saturday evening slot opposite such soft competition as The Andy Williams Show, Let's Make a Deal, and The Newlywed Game. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Fans of Mission: Impossible greeted the start of the series' fourth season with fear and trepidation. To be sure, the series was still second to none in serving up exciting action sequences and labyrinthine counterespionage plotlines. And, yes, most of the familiar cast members were still in attendance, including Peter Graves as IMF leader Jim Phelps, Greg Morris as electronics expert Barney Collier, and Peter Lupus as "house athlete" Willie Armitage. But how, asked the fans, would the series be able to survive the defection of its two most popular regulars, Barbara Bain and Martin Landau? In the case of Landau, the series' producers wasted no time in finding a suitable substitute. Replacing Landau's character of Rollin Hand, a professional actor who skill with disguises and dialects made him indispensable during the IMF's many "infiltration" assignments, the producers came up with professional magician "The Great Paris," who shared Rollin's expertise at makeup and vocal dexterity and could fulfill the same function on the IMF team. Better still, Paris was played by Leonard Nimoy, an actor whose popularity was at its peak by virtue of his recent three-year stint as Mr. Spock on Star Trek. Although Paris could easily have been a Rollin Hand clone with a lesser performer, the brilliant Nimoy came up with a characterization -- and a variety of false identities -- uniquely his own, and would continue doing so until he himself left the series at the end of season five. Unfortunately, the producers were never able to come up with an entirely successful replacement for Barbara Bain; indeed, no fewer than four actresses would be tried out as the "new" Cinnamon (albeit under different character names) for the remainder of the series' run. Although not officially a regular during season four, the talented Lee Meriwether would show up from time to time as "Tracey," a lovely if nondescript Cinnamon substitute. Despite the cast shakeups, Mission: Impossible continued to turn out first-rate episodes during its fourth year on the air, notably the two-part "The Controllers," and the series' only three-parter, "The Falcon," arguably the best-ever showcase for series newcomers Nimoy and Meriwether. Unfortunately, the loss of Landau and Bain proved highly detrimental to the show's ratings: after an all-time-high during season three, the show didn't even crack the Top 30 during season four. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide