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    Maggie Smith Was Imperious in the Most Delightful Way

    Throughout her career and on “Downton Abbey,” she perfected the role of the commanding Englishwoman with an arrow-sharp wit.“Oh for heaven’s sake!” Maggie Smith said in a 2015 interview, waving her hands vigorously in front of her face at the suggestion that she was a “national treasure.”But Smith, who died on Friday at 89, was that very thing, an actor who embodied a quintessentially British character: the imperious, commanding woman, be it an aristocrat or a schoolteacher, who smites the less certain or socially secure with her arrow-sharp wit and finely honed disdain, though delivered in suitably plummy tones.While she worked steadily in theater from the start of her acting career in the 1950s, Smith didn’t become famous until she won an Oscar for her performance in the 1969 film “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.” Early on, she later recalled, she had signed a contract with a film company and received a message from the studio publicity department: “Your fan mail total for this month is nil.”Smith didn’t become famous until she won an Oscar for her performance in the 1969 film “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.” 20th Century Fox/Getty ImagesEven after her breakout performance, her fame was mostly among theater and film cognoscenti, who adored her expressive physicality, brilliant comic timing and subtly moving revelations of character. In 1990, Smith was made a dame of the British Empire. But it wasn’t until Smith was in her 60s, cast as Minerva McGonagall in the “Harry Potter” movies, then in 2010 as Violet Crawley, dowager countess of Grantham, in the “Downton Abbey” television series, that she achieved global fame.“What is a … weekend?” the countess asked in a tone that exquisitely mixed contempt with a soupçon of interest, in one of the first episodes of the show. The line (all credit to the show’s creator, Julian Fellowes) and her delivery summed up her appeal to the enormous “Downton” audience, who couldn’t get enough of Smith’s witty, acerbic character.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Maggie Smith: A Life in Pictures

    Maggie Smith, who died on Friday at 89, was among the most venerable British actors of her era, embarking in the 1950s on a decades-long career and a run of memorable, award-winning performances. She won two Oscars, a Tony, three Golden Globes, four Emmys and several British Academy of Film and Television Awards.But incredibly, she did not reach mainstream stardom until later in her career, first as Minerva McGonagall, the Hogwarts School’s stern and fearless transfiguration teacher, in seven of the eight “Harry Potter” films, and then as Violet Crawley, the acid-tongued dowager countess on the British historical drama “Downton Abbey.”“It’s not even that you particularly want to be an actor,” Smith once said. “You have to be. There’s nothing you can do to stop it.”Here are some snapshots from her life and career.Evening Standard/Hulton Archive, via Getty ImagesMaggie Smith in 1957, the year she made her London stage debut in the musical revue “Share My Lettuce.”Evening Standard/Hulton Archive, via Getty ImagesSmith in 1963, when she appeared in “The V.I.P.s,” a melodrama whose all-star cast also included Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.Bob Dear/Associated PressSmith behind the scenes of the 1968 MGM British comedy caper “Hot Millions.” Vincent Canby, in his review for The New York Times, described her performance as “marvelously funny.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Review: Roald Dahl Is Antisemitic, but Not a Cartoon Villain, in ‘Giant’

    A new play in London portrays the beloved children’s author as a rounded character, while making no apology for his bigotry.It started with a book review.In the August 1983 issue of Literary Review, a British journal, the beloved children’s author Roald Dahl reviewed an eyewitness account of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. In a strident piece, Dahl mourned the disproportionate loss of Arab civilian life in that conflict, and appeared to crassly conflate the actions of the Israeli state with the will of the Jewish people. He also asserted that all Jews had a responsibility to denounce Israel.Later that month, in an interview in The New Statesman newsmagazine, he was asked to clarify those remarks. Dahl went further, saying, “There is a trait in the Jewish character that does provoke animosity.” He went on: “I mean, there’s always a reason why anti-anything crops up anywhere. Even a stinker like Hitler didn’t just pick on them for no reason.”This shameful episode, which left a stain on Dahl’s reputation, is the subject of a new play, “Giant,” written by Mark Rosenblatt and directed by Nicholas Hytner, that runs at the Royal Court Theater in London through Nov. 16. It is an admirably evenhanded treatment that walks a delicate tightrope: “Giant” portrays Dahl as a rounded — and occasionally sympathetic — character while making no apology for his bigotry.We meet Dahl (John Lithgow) and his fiancée Felicity Crosland (Rachael Stirling) in the living room of their countryside home, which is under renovation. (The set, with dust sheets and ladders here and there, is by Bob Crowley). Dahl is poring over the proofs for his next novel, “The Witches.” The Literary Review article has come out and Dahl is facing a backlash. His British publisher, Tom Maschler (Elliot Levey), and an emissary from its American counterpart, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, descend on Dahl and urge him to make an apology, but he’s having none of it.The U.S. publisher’s representative, Jessie Stone (Romola Garai), who is Jewish, suggests to Dahl that “The Witches” — about a secret society of evil child-snatchers — could, in light of his offensive remarks, be interpreted as dog-whistle antisemitism, echoing the Jewish blood libel.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Titaníque’ Was Her Big Hit. Is ‘Big Gay Jamboree’ Really Her Swan Song?

    Two years after debuting the “Titanic” parody, Marla Mindelle says her new show, with Margot Robbie as a producer, may be her last as an actor.There is a trail of trash cans plastered with Marla Mindelle’s face along the 10-minute walk from the Daryl Roth Theater in Union Square, where her musical “Titaníque” has been playing since 2022, to the Orpheum in the East Village, where her latest, “The Big Gay Jamboree,” is in previews.Her face on the poster advertises both shows, and she sees that advertising placement strategy as God (and the shows’ marketing teams) doing some light trolling: retribution for her style of satire. Mindelle, a writer and performer who struck gold with the Céline Dion jukebox parody, “Titaníque,” years after calling it quits on her small Broadway roles, slings the type of vulgar, musical-theater in-jokes only someone with a deep love of (and knowing frustration with) the industry can get away with.It’s that same sense of humor that lifted “Titaníque” from a basement theater in Chelsea into a commercial Off Broadway hit, and is now at work in “The Big Gay Jamboree,” Mindelle’s first musical with an original score.Unlike “Titaníque,” a purposely unpretentious spoof of the James Cameron blockbuster film, “Jamboree” is an elaborately staged show about wanting to leave the world of musicals and is being produced in part by Margot Robbie’s LuckyChap company.Mindelle, 40, sees it as her performing swan song.At a cafe across from the theater where the new production will open on Sept. 30, she detailed what she views as a life of being comically at odds with her chosen profession.The cast of “The Big Gay Jamboree” at the Orpheum Theater in the East Village.James Estrin/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Andrew Scott Will Perform One-Man ‘Vanya’ Off Broadway Next Spring

    The Olivier Award-winning revival, in which the actor plays all of the parts, is to begin previews March 11 at the Lucille Lortel Theater.Andrew Scott, the Irish actor who has parlayed his “Fleabag” hot-priest-ness into a thriving stage and screen career, will perform a one-man version of “Uncle Vanya” Off Broadway next spring.This will not be Scott’s first go at the Chekhov classic: He previously performed all the play’s parts in London’s West End last year; the critic Houman Barekat, writing in The New York Times, was underwhelmed, but critics for British outlets were far more positive, and the production won this year’s Olivier Award for best revival.The New York production is scheduled to begin previews on March 11 and to open on March 18 at the Lucille Lortel Theater in the West Village. It is a commercial production, led by Wessex Grove, Gavin Kalin Productions and Kater Gordon.The original play was first staged in 1899, and is oft-revived; the most recent Broadway production, starring Steve Carell, closed just three months ago, and there was a small-scale Off Broadway production, staged in a loft, in 2023.This one-performer version was adapted by the playwright Simon Stephens, who also wrote the Tony-winning stage adaptation of “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.” Stephens and Scott previously collaborated on “Sea Wall,” a short one-man play that Stephens wrote and Scott performed onstage (in Britain) and on film.The one-man “Vanya,” directed by Sam Yates, is scheduled to run just eight weeks.Scott, 47, who had his big breakthrough with “Fleabag” (where he played the “hot priest”), is also known for the British TV series “Sherlock,” the 2023 film “All of Us Strangers” and the recent streamer “Ripley.” He has appeared on Broadway once, in the 2006 play “The Vertical Hour.” More

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    Jessel Taank is Back For More on ‘RHONY’ Season 2

    Early on a Monday evening during New York Fashion Week, Jessel Taank breezed into the Sabyasachi boutique in the West Village, passing a life-size elephant sculpture near the sidewalk. But the “Real Housewives of New York City” star couldn’t quite say what it was doing there.“Good question,” she said with a laugh. “There’s apparently a great elephant migration that I wasn’t aware happens this time of year, and Sabyasachi is celebrating that tonight.”In fact, The Great Elephant Migration is a touring art installation featuring a herd of 100 faux pachyderms, handcrafted in Tamil Nadu from a dried invasive shrub. (Actual Indian elephant migration in India happens year-round.)Such obliviousness to details seems on brand for Ms. Taank, 41. After all, who could forget when she called TriBeCa “up and coming” on the last season of the “Real Housewives of New York City”?Ms. Taank with an art installation outside the Sabyaschi fashion week party she attended on a recent Monday night. Lanna Apisukh for The New York TimesBut when she commits these faux pas, she does so with a disarming smile, one that has won over prickly fans. By the end of the show’s 14th season — and the first of the cast reboot — it was clear that she had received the villain edit, criticized for what came off as willful ignorance and bratty behavior. But she had also found a fan base so ardent that, according to Rolling Stone, its members call themselves “Taank Tops.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Jessel Taank is Back For More on Season Two

    Early on a Monday evening during New York Fashion Week, Jessel Taank breezed into the Sabyasachi boutique in the West Village, passing a life-size elephant sculpture near the sidewalk. But the “Real Housewives of New York City” star couldn’t quite say what it was doing there.“Good question,” she said with a laugh. “There’s apparently a great elephant migration that I wasn’t aware happens this time of year, and Sabyasachi is celebrating that tonight.”In fact, The Great Elephant Migration is a touring art installation featuring a herd of 100 faux pachyderms, handcrafted in Tamil Nadu from a dried invasive shrub. (Actual Indian elephant migration in India happens year-round.)Such obliviousness to details seems on brand for Ms. Taank, 41. After all, who could forget when she called TriBeCa “up and coming” on the last season of the “Real Housewives of New York City”?Ms. Taank with an art installation outside the Sabyaschi fashion week party she attended on a recent Monday night. Lanna Apisukh for The New York TimesBut when she commits these faux pas, she does so with a disarming smile, one that has won over prickly fans. By the end of the show’s 14th season — and the first of the cast reboot — it was clear that she had received the villain edit, criticized for what came off as willful ignorance and bratty behavior. But she had also found a fan base so ardent that, according to Rolling Stone, its members call themselves “Taank Tops.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Late Night Roasts New York Mayor Eric Adams Over His Indictment

    Jimmy Fallon joked that it’s “always fun when the city mimics the exact plot of a Batman movie.”Welcome to Best of Late Night, a rundown of the previous night’s highlights that lets you sleep — and lets us get paid to watch comedy. Here are the 50 best movies on Netflix right now.You Never Forget Your FirstNew York City Mayor Eric Adams has been indicted on five federal charges of bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations.“Yeah, it’s always fun when the city mimics the exact plot of a Batman movie,” Jimmy Fallon said on Thursday.“Yep, Adams is the first sitting mayor of New York City to be indicted. It’s shocking. When Rudy Giuliani heard that, he was, like, ‘That can’t be right.’” — JIMMY FALLON“Well, it turns out Eric Adams was right — crime is way up in New York City.” — SETH MEYERS“Imagine having to call Rudy to ask, ‘You never got indicted as mayor — what’s your secret?’” — SETH MEYERS“I’ll bet he’s really regretting holding that press conference with a trash can full of shredded evidence.” — SETH MEYERS“Can someone check if there’s bottle service at Rikers?” — DESI LYDICThe Punchiest Punchlines (More Eric Adams Edition)“New York Mayor Eric Adams was indicted yesterday on federal criminal charges, and that distant laughter you hear is coming from every rat in New York City: ‘[imitating rat] You thought you was gonna take us out? Now what, wise guy?’” — SETH MEYERS“Fellow Democrats are calling on him to resign, whereas Republicans are urging him to run for governor of North Carolina.” — JIMMY KIMMEL“That’s right, Eric Adams was indicted yesterday on federal criminal charges. Oh, please let his little robot cop do the arrest. It’ll be like when Allison Williams realized she shouldn’t have built M3gan.” — SETH MEYERS“Now, to be fair, Adams is, of course, innocent until proven guilty — although it would be a lot easier to believe he wasn’t doing crimes if he didn’t dress like a gangster from ‘Guys & Dolls.’” — DESI LYDIC“It’s a sad day in New York City when foreign nations are bribing the mayor to rush permits. That is the mob’s job, OK? Those should be American bribes!” — DESI LYDICThe Bits Worth WatchingStephen Colbert harmonized with the country singer Chris Stapleton on Thursday’s “Late Show.”Also, Check This Out“We really did consider each other brother and sister, even though I might have had a small crush on her as well, which was weird,” John Francis Daley said of his relationship with Linda Cardellini.Chris Haston/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal, via Getty ImagesPaul Feig, Judd Apatow, and several cast and crew members reflect on the sleeper hit status of “Freaks and Geeks” as the show celebrates its 25th anniversary. More