113 Quotes by Maggie Smith

It seems to me there is a change in what audiences want to see. I can only hope that’s correct, because there’s an awful lot of people of my age around now and we outnumber the others.

I don’t think films about elderly people have been made very much.

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.

What is embarrassment but a relative of fear? You’ve been seen – caught – at being imperfect.

Today I think of myself as a ‘recovering pessimist.’ I know that optimism is not at odds with wisdom. It’s quite the opposite. I think of cynicism as cool but lazy, while hope is desperately uncool – it has sweaty palms and an earnest smile on its face. What I know to be true is that one hopeful person will accomplish more than a hundred cynics. Why? Because the hopeful person will try.

Give the present the gift of your full attention.

When you get into the granny era, you’re lucky to get anything.

I’m far, far, far from that. But of course, that’s one of the joys of acting is that you can move up in the world, even if – you know, in the characters that you’re playing, even if you don’t.

There was nobody in the family who had ever done anything like that before. My brothers – I had two brothers. They were twins. They both became architects. They were both six years older.