Oscar-winning British actress, who immortalised the characters like Professor McGonagall and Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey, breathed her last on Friday, September 27. She was 89.  

In a statement, her sons Toby Stephens and Chris Larkin made the announcement of her death. “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,” the statement read.  

While Maggie Smith immortalised Harry Potter’s stout and caring Professor Minerva McGonagall, the British actress bagged the Academy Awards for Best Actress for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) and Best Supporting Actress for California Suite (1978). However, it is her unputdownable performance as Harry Potter’s strict, yet strongest cheerleader that made her popular among the younger generation in 2000. Besides, she was Oscar-nominated for Othello (1965), Travels with My Aunt (1972), A Room with a View (1985), and Gosford Park (2001). Later, between 2010 and 2015, she famously portrayed the character of the acid-tongued Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey. Her brief monologue on tea in The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2012) is still popular on social media.  

Maggie Smith was revered enormously on stage as well. She was born in 1934 in Oxford and started her acting career in the city’s Playhouse as a teenager.  

Smith was married twice: to fellow actor Robert Stephens between 1967 and 1975 and to Beverley Cross between 1975 and his death in 1998.

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