Chris and Toby are far too sane to be upset any more.
Maggie Smith

I believe that I am past my prime. I had reckoned on my prime lasting till I was at least fifty.
Maggie Smith

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.
Maggie Smith

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

I like the ephemeral thing about theatre, every performance is like a ghost - it's there and then it's gone.
Maggie Smith

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

I said 'It can't go on' and he said 'No, it can't.' Honestly, I don't think I could have mattered less to him by then. But by then, nothing mattered to him.
Maggie Smith

I tend to head for what's amusing because a lot of things aren't happy. But usually you can find a funny side to practically anything.
Maggie Smith

It's true I don't tolerate fools but then they don't tolerate me, so I am spiky. Maybe that's why I'm quite good at playing spiky elderly ladies.
Maggie Smith

My career is chequered. Then I think I got pigeon-holed in humour; Shakespeare is not my thing.
Maggie Smith


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

Speak your mind, even if your voice shakes.
Maggie Smith

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?
Maggie Smith

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.
Maggie Smith

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

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.
Maggie Smith

There's a difference between solitude and loneliness.
Maggie Smith

There's this wonderful first assistant and he'll be saying, 'Now Harry goes down among the dragons.' You have to hold yourself together. Because if you lose it for a second then you're sunk.
Maggie Smith

When you get into the granny era, you're lucky to get anything.
Maggie Smith