# What is the best Maggie Smith role of all time?

> Oscar winner, BAFTA legend, and the most beloved scene-stealer in British cinema — from Jean Brodie to Violet Crawley, her withering put-downs are a national treasure. Which Maggie is your Maggie?

*By YPB Team · Published April 10, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/what-is-the-best-maggie-smith-role-of-all-time*

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## Current results (no votes yet)

1. **Othello**
   A 1965 film adaptation where Smith plays Desdemona alongside Laurence Olivier, earning her first Academy Award nomination.
2. **The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie**
   A 1969 drama where Smith plays Jean Brodie, a charismatic Edinburgh schoolteacher with fascist sympathies, winning the Academy Award for Best Actress.
3. **California Suite**
   A 1978 Neil Simon comedy where Smith plays Diana Barrie, a British actress attending the Oscars with her gay husband, earning her second Academy Award.
4. **A Room with a View**
   A 1985 Merchant Ivory adaptation where Smith plays Charlotte Bartlett, the prim chaperone who tries to manage her free-spirited niece in Florence.
5. **Hook**
   A 1991 Steven Spielberg fantasy where Smith plays the elderly Wendy Darling, who implores a grown-up Peter Pan to remember who he was.
6. **Sister Act**
   A 1992 comedy where Smith plays the uptight Mother Superior who must accept Whoopi Goldberg's show-stopping singer into her convent.
7. **Tea with Mussolini**
   A 1999 Franco Zeffirelli film where Smith plays Lady Hester Random, a formidable expatriate Englishwoman living in Fascist Florence.
8. **Gosford Park**
   A 2001 Robert Altman murder mystery where Smith plays Lady Constance Trentham, the acerbic, cash-strapped aristocrat who provides some of the film's sharpest wit.
9. **Harry Potter Series**
   The 2001–2011 fantasy franchise where Smith plays Professor Minerva McGonagall, the stern but loyal deputy headmistress of Hogwarts.
10. **Downton Abbey**
   A 2010–2015 ITV period drama where Smith plays Violet Crawley, the razor-tongued Dowager Countess whose withering one-liners became iconic.
11. **The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel**
   A 2012 comedy-drama where Smith plays Muriel Donnelly, a prejudiced housekeeper who travels to India for hip surgery and undergoes an unexpected transformation.
12. **The Lady in the Van**
   A 2015 biopic where Smith plays Miss Mary Shepherd, a cantankerous homeless woman who parks her van in Alan Bennett's driveway for 15 years.

Tags: movies, actors, performances, maggie smith