Maggie Smith

In Gosford Park (2001), Maggie Smith makes Constance Trentham's contempt sound like an unremarkable contribution to the conversation. She does not need to start a quarrel; the ease of her delivery tells us how seldom anyone has answered back. We laughed, then felt uneasy, because she made humiliating another person seem so ordinary. Julian Fellowes supplies the insults, but Smith gives them the assurance of a woman who expects agreement. Robert Altman's ensemble gives us plenty to watch, yet we kept waiting for her to speak again.

The breakthrough was the title role in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), followed by years in which she divided her work between stage and screen. California Suite (1978) and A Room with a View (1985) belong to that period. The vocal precision and expressive gestures could become mannered, a fair reservation about an actor whose technique was so easy to recognise. Even in her more flamboyant work, though, there was often fragility beneath the assurance.

Hook (1991) is a useful correction to the idea that Smith's chief purpose was to be withering. As Granny Wendy, she offers affection without insisting that we notice how touching it is. Steven Spielberg's film keeps finding noisy things to do, and her quieter scenes make that restlessness harder to forgive. We would not recommend the whole film on the strength of her contribution: its crowded Neverland exhausts our patience. But she makes Wendy worth listening to, and suggests how much less fuss the film might have needed.

The later parts included Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter series (2001–2011) and the Dowager Countess in Downton Abbey (2010–2015). It is easy to let those familiar roles reduce the memory of her work to an imperious look and a cutting remark. That misses the vulnerability she could bring to comedy, and the unforced affection that makes her the person we want to hear in Hook. Start with Gosford Park, where the timing is a pleasure and the cruelty remains unpleasant.