Maggie Smith Quotes

When I started acting almost 50 years ago, it wasn't about fame. It was about acting.

It made it feel impossible, quite honestly, because filming - you film come rain, come shine, come whatever. And it did rain a lot. And of course, that's what she must have gone through. Of course it rained; of course it was cold,you know, it really was quite hard to be out there in the rain.

The thing is, often press people ask questions that are so personal that even your nearest and dearest wouldn't ask them.

If you're lucky, I think you know what you want to do with your life. I think that's a greater gift that any of the gifts you might have when you do know, if you know what I mean. It must be awful to not know what to do.

I had a very good English teacher who said to me that she thought I ought to do it. She - I don't know, she saw something thank goodness because I think if it hadn't been encouraged by somebody that serious, I'm not sure what would've happened to me.

The last couple of years have been a write-off, though I'm beginning to feel like a person now. My energy is coming back.

Good Bones

Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I've shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I'll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that's a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.

The chemotherapy was very peculiar, something that makes you feel much worse than the cancer itself, a very nasty thing. I used to go to treatment on my own, and nearly everybody else was with somebody. I wouldn't have liked that. Why would you want to make anybody sit in those places?

I'm hopeless - all I know is that time is going past so fast.

Some people say you have to fight cancer. But it was fighting me. The cure was worse than the disease, and it left me totally exhausted and depressed. I just hid myself away in my daughter-in-law's flat.

There is a kind of invisible thread between the actor and the audience, and when it's there it's stunning, and there is nothing to match that.

I loved Robert Altman, so gentle yet naughty! And Julian Fellowes writes so beautifully.

One went to school, one wanted to act, one started to act, and one's still acting.

Sort of what you do in drama school when asked to play something way out of your reach. Anyway, we used to laugh a lot about that. I used to say I'm not going to act old, Penelope. I'll just be myself.

I have many good friends, but I tend to keep to myself anyway. It's odd, doing things and having no one to share them with.

I know there is something out there and like most people, I tend to believe in it more when things go bad.

An actor is somebody who communicates someone else's words and emotions to an audience. It's not me. It's what writers want me to be.

I just did adore Daniel - Daniel Radcliffe, who I had worked with before "Harry Potter" and spent a long time telling all the producers they had to see him because I thought he was so terrific. And it's been sad thinking about it because of Alan Rickman.

I had been feeling a little rum. I didn't think it was anything serious because years ago I felt a lump and it was benign. I assumed this would be too. It kind of takes the wind out of your sails, and I don't know what the future holds, if anything.

I am just surprised to be doing anything at my age actually. When you think of where I am now and where I've come from, I am very pleased and very grateful to be standing up and delivering Julian's great lines.

I think lots of actors are very nervous and shy. I know lots of them who are, and some who aren't of course.

The performances you have in your head are always much better than the performances on stage.

I longed to be bright and most certainly never was. I was rather hopeless, I suspect.

I'm just glad to get any role ... the fact that they're all 90 is neither here nor there! Actually, it was Hook that started it. I think it was Peggy Ashcroft who couldn't do the part and somebody was asked how old was I and would I be able to do the part, and the person replied "92" very quickly. And so I've been stuck ever since! But I'm actually very grateful.

Listen, I must be 110 by now. Granny is going to kick the bucket at some point.

I like being outside and working with the elements. The elemental aspects of it. The physicality of it.

I had no idea that that was around in the family anywhere. Maybe it never was. But - so they broke the way for me, if you know what I mean. I have no idea where I got the idea from to do what I do. But I think they - Ian and Alistair, my brothers kind of opened a lot of doors for me onto the world - you know, made it seem to be a very, very interesting place.

Try not to cry too much because it can be pretty heart-breaking and pretty hard.

I think there's always great tension because there never seems to be enough - there is always pressure. There's always pressure because there isn't enough time. There's never enough time for a movie, it seems to me. Never.

I fear that I won't work in the theatre again. I'm sad about that. But I won't retire.

Don't be defeatist, dear, it's very middle class.

Alan Rickman was such a terrific actor, and that was such a terrific character that he played. And it was a joy to be with him. We used to laugh together because we ran out of reaction shots. They were always - when everything had been done and the children were finished, they would turn the camera around and we'd have to do various reaction shots of amazement or sadness and things. We used to say we'd got to about number 200-and-something and we'd run out of knowing what to do when the camera came around on us. But he was a joy.

I think he [Leonardo DiCaprio] is a terrific actor. And I've - I've been rooting and voting for him since "Gilbert Grape." I thought he was so amazing in that one. He was a young man, really very young boy.

At my age, I don't plan that far ahead. I don't even buy green bananas."

Maggie Smith in The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.

People say it gets better but it doesn't. It just gets different, that's all.

I'd done "Gosford Park," a film that Julian Fellowes had written that Robert Altman directed.

There's a difference between solitude and loneliness.

I've been playing old parts forever. I play 93 quite often. When you've done it more than once, you take the hint. I think it's a great burden if you're one of those fantastic stars who've always been beautiful; then I think it's hard.

I'm so moved to hear Celia Johnson again, so lovely.