Maggie Smith, who died on Friday at 89, was among the most venerable British actors of her era, embarking in the 1950s on a decades-long career and a run of memorable, award-winning performances. She won two Oscars, a Tony, three Golden Globes, four Emmys and several British Academy of Film and Television Awards.
But incredibly, she did not reach mainstream stardom until later in her career, first as Minerva McGonagall, the Hogwarts School’s stern and fearless transfiguration teacher, in seven of the eight “Harry Potter” films, and then as Violet Crawley, the acid-tongued dowager countess on the British historical drama “Downton Abbey.”
“It’s not even that you particularly want to be an actor,” Smith once said. “You have to be. There’s nothing you can do to stop it.”
Here are some snapshots from his life and career.
Maggie Smith in 1957, the year she made her London stage debut in the musical revue “Share My Lettuce.”
Smith in 1963, when she appeared in “The V.I.P.s,” a melodrama whose all-star cast also included Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.
Smith behind the scenes of the 1968 MGM British comedy caper “Hot Millions.” Vincent Canby, in his review for The New York Times, described her performance as “marvelously funny.”