Irish-born actress and mother of Angela Lansbury died 50 years ago, writes Ivor Casey

 

She worked mainly as a character actress performing with grace and demure, demonstrating a flare for glamour and sophistication, showcased from the stage to the screen. However, she was an actress whose legacy would be partially overshadowed by the success of her daughter, placing her into the category of “mother to the acclaimed Dame Angela Lansbury”.

Nonetheless Irish-born actress Moyna Macgill proved to make an impression, appearing in such theatrical productions as Othello, TV dramas such as The Twilight Zone and motion pictures including The Picture Of Dorian Gray (1945). This November marked fifty years since Moyna passed away.

Originally born Charlotte Lillian McIldowie on 10 December, 1895, Moyna was the daughter of Elizabeth Jane Mageean and William McIldowie, of Scottish descent, and raised at 42 Eglantine Avenue in Belfast. Known as Chattie, Moyna was born into a privileged family with her father working as a solicitor, and as a director of the Grand Opera House in Belfast, which had an impact on Moyna’s future career as she developed a taste for the arts and performing from a young age. She also pursued a love of fine art and was a member of the Belfast Art society with whom she exhibited watercolour paintings before she pursued with her other ambition for acting.

After moving to London, Moyna made her stage début in 1918 in Love In a Cottage by William Somerset Maugham at West End’s Globe Theatre, known today as the John Gielgud Theatre. Impressed with her performance, established English actor and theatre manager, Sir Gerald du Maurier, took a keen interest in Moyna who was still known at this time as Charlotte McIldowie. It was du Maurier who recommended that she change her name to Moyna Macgill as he saw it as a more “stage friendly” name and from then on this was to be her pseudonym.

Moyna continued her career in a variety of plays at London’s West End including playing the part of Hannah Ferguson in the play John Ferguson, written by Belfast born writer St. John Greer Ervine which she performed at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith in London in 1920.
The play co-starred several other Irish actors including J.M. Kerrigan and Maire O’Neill who were both stars of Dublin’s Abbey Theatre. Moyna followed on playing the title role in “Rhoda Fleming” at The Ambassador

Theatre and in a performance of the work “Will Shakespeare” at the Shaftesbury Theatre, both in 1921. She won critical acclaim for her portrayal of Desdemona in Shakespeare’s “Othello”.

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