Profile on: Maggie Smith

Dame Margaret Natalie Smith, CH, DBE has had a career in stage film and television that has spanned over sixty years, making her début (on stage) in 1952. She was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire(DBE) in the 1990 New Year Honours for services to the performing arts, and Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour(CH) in the 2014 Birthday Honours for services to drama.
Smith was born on 28th December 1934, in Romford, Essex, England. When she was 18 her career began on stage at the Oxford Playhouse. For her work on stage, she has won five Best Actress Evening Standard Awards, and one Tony. She has played many TV roles, such as Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice and David Copperfield. Her most well known television appearance, however, is in ITV's Downton Abbey, as Violet Crawley.
Maggie Smith has been married, twice, once to Robert Stephens (1967), with whom she had two children, the actors Chris Larkin and Toby Stephens. The couple divorced in 1974, and a year later she married the playwright Beverley Cross.
In January 1988, she was diagnosed with Graves Disease, and in 2007 was diagnosed with breast cancer, and she made a full recovery from birth.
She first drew praise on screen for the crime film Nowhere to Go - which resulted in her first BAFTA nomination. In 1965 she played Desdamona in Othello, for which she recieved an Academy Award and Golden Globe nomination.
Maggie Smith has two Academy Awards, one for Best Actress in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, and the other for Best Supporting Actress for California Suite. Alongside nominations for Travels With My Aunt, A Room with a View and The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne, this means she has been nominated six times. Other notable films include Death on the Nile, Sister Act, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and of course, her role as Minerva McGonagall in the Harry Potter franchise.
Her most recent films are Gnomeo and Juliet (Lady Blueberry), Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and it's sequel, Quartet, My Old Lady and The Lady in the Van, adapted from the play of the same name, in which Smith plays the Lady in the Van, who lived on Alan Bennet's drive for 15 years. Smith has played the role twice before, and while promoting the films, appeared on a chat show for the first time in 42 years.