Star of Stage & Screen Angela Lansbury Joins Cast of Disney's MARY POPPINS RETURNS

In a special feature published in this week's The Hollywood Reporter, legendary song and dance man Dick Van Dyke confirmed reports that he will indeed appear in Disney's upcoming reboot of MARY POPPINS.

The Tony and Emmy Award winner will reportedly portray the son of the elderly banker in the upcoming film and will even get to do what he describes as "a little song and dance."

While Disney revealed months ago that the highly-anticipated sequel will star Emily Blunt as the iconic nanny, HAMILTON's Lin-Manuel Miranda in a 'Bert-like' role, and multi Oscar winner Meryl Streep, Van Dyke also revealed to THR that star of stage and screen Angela Lansbury will be making an appearance in the film as well. "It's a great cast," the actor shared. "Meryl Streep, Angela Lansbury and that guy [Lin-Manuel Miranda] from Hamilton."

While no details as to the role Lansbury will portray have been revealed, the talented actress is no stranger to the Wonderful World of Disney. She lent her voice to the beloved character "Mrs. Potts" in the studio's 1991 animated classic, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST.

Below, watch Angela Lansbury perform the "Beauty And The Beast" theme at this year's 25th Anniversary Screening of the film:

Winner of five Tony Awards, Lansbury made her Broadway debut in 1957 in Hotel Paradiso. In 1960, she returned to Broadway in Shelagh Delaney's A Taste of Honey. In 1964, she starred in her first musical, Anyone Can Whistle, and in 1966, she triumphed as Mame, winning her first Tony. She won three more Tonys for Dear World (1968), Gypsy (1974), and Sweeney Todd (1979). After a 23-year hiatus, she returned to Broadway in 2007 in Terrence McNally's Deuce. In 2009 she won her fifth Tony Award as Madame Arcati in Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit. She also appeared as Madame Armfeldt in A Little Night Music (2010), and in Gore Vidal's The Best Man (2012). In 2013, she appeared in the acclaimed Australian tour of Alfred Uhry's Driving Miss Daisy, with James Earl Jones and Boyd Gaines, a production which was filmed for cinemas.

In March 2014 she again played Madame Arcati at London's Gielgud Theatre, for which she won the Olivier Award. Previous London appearances were in the RSC's production of Edward Albee's All Over at the Aldwych, Gypsy, and Hamlet.

She has appeared in over 60 films starting with Gaslight at age 17 (first Academy Award nomination), The Portrait of DorIan Gray (second Academy Award nomination), and The Manchurian Candidate (third Academy Award nomination). She was THE VOICE of Mrs. Potts in Disney's BEAUTY AND THE BEAST and more recently, she co-starred in Emma Thompson's Nanny McPhee and with Jim Carrey in Mr. Popper's Penguins.

From 1984 through 1996 she starred as Jessica Fletcher on Murder, She Wrote, the longest-running detective drama series in TV history, for which she won four of her six Golden Globe Awards. She is recipient of the National Medal of the Arts, the KENNEDY Center Honors. In addition to her five Tonys, Olivier, and six Golden Globes, she has been nominated for eighteen Emmys and three Oscars, and in 2013 was awarded an Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in Motion Pictures. She was named a Dame of the British EMPIRE by Queen Elizabeth II and was invested at Windsor Castle on April 15, 2014.

Photo Credit: Genevieve Rafter-Keddy