Dame Maggie Smith's acting career spanned over 70 years, from her stage debut in 1952 to becoming one of Britain's most garlanded performers, winning two Academy Awards, seven BAFTAs and a Tony along the way. She won her first Oscar for the title role in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), a performance that became one of the defining roles of her career. Late in life she found huge new audiences as the acid-tongued Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey and as the formidable Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter films, cementing her as one of the most beloved British actresses of any generation.