I will always be grateful to the Harry Potter series, Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones and the Lord of the Rings movies—these shows/series starred fairly obscure but brilliant British stage actors from the National Theatre, and catapulted them to international superstardom. Actors who’d slaved for years on London stages, night after night, bagging the odd Hollywood role, but by and large, remaining stage craftsmen in their native land.

One of these performers was Maggie Smith, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and California Suite gave her early Oscars, but for all her histrionic heftiness, for the most part her popularity remained in the United Kingdom—for audiences weaned on streaming platforms, and multiplexes and movie houses she was a character actress, a Mother Superior in Sister Act.