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Dame Maggie Smith, one of Britain’s best-known actresses whose long career ranged from starring opposite Laurence Olivier in “Othello” on stage and screen, to roles in “Harry Potter” and “Downton Abbey,” has died, her sons announced in a statement shared by their publicist Clair Dobbs.
She was 89.
“It is with great sadness we have to announce the death of Dame Maggie Smith. 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,” the statement reads. “She leaves two sons and five loving grandchildren who are devastated by the loss of their extraordinary mother and grandmother. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the wonderful staff at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital for their care and unstinting kindness during her final days.”
Smith was born in 1934 in Ilford, then a middle-class east London suburb. Shortly before the start of World War II the family moved to Oxford, where her father worked as a pathologist at Oxford University.
On graduating from high school, Smith attended the Oxford Playhouse School from 1951 to 1953, making her stage debut in an Oxford University Dramatic Society production of William Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night.”
She went on to appear on Broadway in “New Faces of 1956,” and then held the lead comedian role in the London revue “Share My Lettuce,” between 1957 and 1958. She soon began appearing regularly in plays at The Old Vic theater in London.
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Dame Maggie Smith poses for a photo in London in 2015.
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Smith poses for a photo in 1957.
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Smith appears in a Royal Shakespeare Company production of "As You Like It" in 1963.
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Smith sits in her dressing room with telegrams pinned around the mirror behind her in 1963.
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Actor Robert Stephens throws a stage punch at Smith during a rehearsal in 1966. Stephens and Smith married the following year and had two children together.
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Smith shakes hands with Queen Elizabeth II at a premiere of "Othello" in London in 1966.
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Smith sits in her dressing room for a production of Shakespeare's "Much Ado about Nothing" at The Old Vic in London in 1967.
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Smith appears in "Oh! What a Lovely War" in 1968.
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Smith earned her first Academy Award for her role as the titular character in the 1969 film "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie."
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Smith holds her eldest son Chris Larkin in 1970.
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Paparazzi photograph Smith in 1970.
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Stephens kisses Smith at a party to celebrate her Academy Award win for best actress in 1970. The couple divorced in 1975.
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Smith stars in "Travels With My Aunt" in 1972.
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Smith rehearses with Dave Allen for a production of "Peter Pan" in 1973.
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Smith won the best supporting actress Oscar in 1979 for her role in "California Suite."
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Smith, far right, appears in 1981's "Clash of the Titans."
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Helena Bonham Carter and Smith star in "A Room With a View" in 1985.
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Smith poses for a photo with her husband, Beverley Cross, and two sons, Chris and Toby, at their country home in Sussex, England, in 1986. Smith and Cross were married from 1975 until his death in 1998.
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Smith and Lambert Wilson star in a production of "The Infernal Machine" at the Lyric Theatre in London in 1986.
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Kelly Macdonald and Smith appear in the 2001 film "Gosford Park."
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From left, Ellen Burstyn, Smith, Fionnula Flanagan and Shirley Knight star in "Divine Secrets Of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood" in 2002.
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Smith played the role of Violet Crawley, the Dowager Countess of Grantham in the “Downton Abbey” television series and films from 2010-2022.
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Smith appears in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2" in 2011. She played the role of Professor Minerva McGonagall in seven of the Harry Potter films.
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Smith attends a photocall for her 2012 film "Quartet."
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Smith signs autographs at the BFI London Film Festival in 2012.
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Smith appears in "The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" with Celia Imrie, Ronald Pickup, Diana Hardcastle, Judi Dench and Bill Nighy in 2015.
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Smith appears with Alex Jennings in 2015's "The Lady In The Van."
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Smith, second from left in the middle row, attends an Order of the Companions of Honour celebration with Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip in London in 2017.
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Smith watches the women's singles final tennis match at the 2023 Wimbledon Championships in London.
In 1964, she played Desdemona to Olivier’s Othello, before reprising the role for the film version the following year. Smith won her first Academy Award for best actress in 1969 for her portrayal of an unconventional schoolteacher in the movie “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.”
In 1978, she was awarded a second Academy Award, this time for best supporting actress, for her performance in Neil Simon’s “California Suite.” She has also received British Academy Film Awards for her work, including for her roles in 1985’s “A Room with a View” and 1987’s “The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne.”
Smith was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1990, and from then on was widely known as Dame Maggie Smith.
But in many ways, her best roles were yet to come, including a starring role in the 1999 classic “Tea with Mussolini,” about a group of upper-middle class English women in Florence, Italy, during the time of fascism, directed by Franco Zeffirelli.
Perhaps she will be best remembered as an actress who managed to achieve not only longevity but even greater fame in later life.
She came to the notice of younger viewers as the strict but fair witchcraft teacher Minerva McGonagall in “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” (2001), also appearing in several “Harry Potter” sequels.
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"Downton Abbey" would be much less entertaining without the cutting Dowager Countess, played by Maggie Smith.
Acclaim came again on both sides of the Atlantic for her interpretation of the caustic-tongued Violet Crawley, the Dowager Countess of Grantham in “Downton Abbey,” the acclaimed period drama about the British aristocracy. She received three Emmy Awards for the role, which she reprised for a 2019 feature-length film.
In her later years, Smith became a role model for ageing gracefully, a process she handled with her customary charm and wit.
When asked in 2017 by the UK magazine “Women’s World” why she had not gone to more award ceremonies, Smith replied: “I truly think if I went to Los Angeles, for example, I think I’d frighten people… They don’t see older people.”
Smith was married twice, to the actor Robert Stephens – the couple divorced in 1974 – and again to playwright Beverley Cross, from 1975 until his death in 1998.