Dame Maggie Smith — the British acting legend who shot to stardom with her Oscar-winning role in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and whose multi-decade career was capped by the Harry Potter movies and the hit series Downton Abbey — has died. She was 89.
Her sons, actors Toby Stephens and Chris Larkin, issued a statement to the BBC on Friday.
“It is with great sadness we have to announce the death of Dame Maggie Smith,” they said. “She passed away peacefully in hospital early this morning, Friday 27th September. An intensely private person, she was with friends and family at the end. She leaves two sons and five loving grandchildren who are devastated by the loss of their extraordinary mother and grandmother.”
Widely considered one of the greatest British actresses of both stage and screen, Maggie Smith tackled many of the most challenging theatrical roles ever written while juggling a movie and TV career that brought her two Academy Awards and three Emmys.
Her high-pitched voice, angular face, and long limbs made her a natural fit for comedy, and she became closely associated with the plays of Noel Coward, especially Private Lives. She could alternately strike an intimidating and imperious air, which led to her being frequently cast as snobbish aristocrats.
Smith was closely associated with Laurence Olivier, who invited her to work with him at London’s National Theater, where she performed in numerous classics. In her later years, she specialized in playing spiky elderly women, most notably her Dowager Countess in Downton Abbey who famously asked, “What is a weekend?”
Smith appeared in all six seasons of Downton Abbey as well as the subsequent two movies based on the series.
She also appeared in all of the Harry Potter movies as the imperious Professor McGonagall — a role that reignited her stardom starting in her late 60s.
To an older generation, Smith will always be associated with the titular Scottish school teacher in the movie version of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), for which won her the first of two Oscars. She later appeared in such notable movies as Travels with My Aunt, A Room with a View, The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, Gosford Park, and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and its sequel.
She won her second Oscar for Neil Simon’s California Suite (1978), in which she played a highly regarded British actress who is nominated for an Oscar but loses. Her other Hollywood movies include supporting roles in Sister Act and its sequel, as well as the Steven Spielberg movie Hook.
Throughout her six-decade career, Smith frequently returned to the stage, performing in classics and contemporary dramas. She won a Tony Award in 1987 for Peter Shaffer’s comedy Lettice and Lovage. Later, she specialized in Edward Albee’s aloof and alienated society ladies, performing in Three Tall Women, A Delicate Balance, and The Lady from Dubuque.
Smith was married to the late actor Robert Stephens, with whom she had her two sons. That marriage ended in divorce. She was later married to writer Beverly Cross, who died in 1998.
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