Maggie Smith biography

Synopsis

Early Life and Education

Maggie Smith was born Margaret Natalie Smith in Ilford, Essex, England, to Margaret (Hutton) and Nathaniel Smith. When she was 4 years old, her family moved to Oxford, where her father worked as a pathologist at Oxford University.

After graduating from high school, Smith attended the Oxford Playhouse School in 1951-53. She made her professional stage début in 1952, playing Viola in an Oxford University Dramatics Society production of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.

Early Career in Theater and Film

After a brief detour to New York’s Broadway, where she performed in the comedy revue New Faces of 1956, Smith also began to act in film. Her first role was a short, uncredited appearance in Child in the House in 1956, followed by a larger part in the crime drama Nowhere to Go in 1959.

In the 1960s, Smith was active in the National Theatre of Great Britain. She played Desdemona to Laurence Olivier’s Othello in 1964; the two of them reprised their roles in a film version of Othello the following year. While at the National Theatre, she acted in classic dramas by major authors such as Henrik Ibsen and Anton Chekhov.

Career Highlights

Smith has received two Academy Awards. She received the first (for best actress) in 1969, for her portrayal of an idealistic, unorthodox schoolteacher in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. She won the second (for best supporting actress) in 1978, in honor of her performance in Neil Simon’s California Suite. She has also received British Academy Film Awards for her work, including for her roles in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, 1984's A Private Function, 1985's A Room with a View and 1987's The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne. Additionally, she has received several accolades for her stage performances, including a Variety Club Award for her performance in Noël Coward’s Private Lives in 1972, and a Tony Award for Lettice and Lovage in 1990.

Throughout the 1990s, Smith acted in a diverse range of projects, from the 1993 comedy Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit with Whoopi Goldberg, to the 1997 literary adaptation Washington Square and the 1999 ensemble drama Tea with Mussolini. Her appearance as a snobbish aristocrat in Robert Altman’s Gosford Park (2001) received especially positive notice.

Smith captured the attention of a new generation when she played the strict witchcraft teacher Minerva McGonagall in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001). She continued to appear as Professor McGonagall in the following Harry Potter films, even during her fight against breast cancer in 2008.