Crime Writer Margot Kinberg

This year, we lost a number of beloved actors, singers, and others whose work we admired. One of those we lost was Dame Maggie Smith, star of stage and screen, whose birthday it would have been as this is posted. She received a number of awards, and her work was both a critical and commercial success. Now, you may be asking, ‘What does Dame Maggie Smith have to do with crime fiction?’ The fact is, several of her performances were arguably in crime-fictional stories, or involved crime fiction at some level. Here are just a few.

You may remember Smith from her Academy Award winning performance as the title character in 1969’s The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, adapted from the Muriel Spark novel of the same name. Fans of the book and film will know that it takes place mostly in an exclusive Scottish girls school, where Miss Brodie is a teacher. As the novel goes on, we learn that she is convinced that her way of thinking, teaching, and living is right – that God is on her side. Her strong personality draws in an impressionable group of young girls, the ‘Brodie set,’ and sets in motion a course of events that for some, ends tragically. While there aren’t murders and criminal investigations in the story, there is psychological tension as we see how Miss Brodie holds sway over the ‘Brodie set’ and dominates them. There are also undercurrents of sexual exploitation in the story. Smith brought Miss Brodie to life in the film and depicted her way of manipulating others.

In the 1978 adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile, Smith played the role of Miss Bowers. If you’ve read the book, you’ll know that Miss Bowers is nurse/companion to the very wealthy Marie Von Schuyler. So, when Miss Von Schuyler decides to take a cruise of the Nile, Miss Bowers goes along. During the trip, she becomes enmeshed in a murder case when newlywed Linnet Doyle is killed. Hercule Poirot is on the same cruise, and he investigates. The first suspect is Linnet’s former best friend, Jacqueline de Bellefort. But it’s actually Miss Bowers who is able to disprove that theory. That means Poirot has to look elsewhere for the killer. The role of Miss Bowers isn’t a major role, but it does play an important part in the story. Smith’s performance in the film was such that she was nominated for the BAFTA award for Best Supporting Actress.

Smith played an interesting role in the 1982 adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Evil Under the Sun. This adaptation doesn’t really stay as close to the original novel as some other films have, but, like the novel, it takes place at a hotel resort. In the film, the resort is in the Adriatic (in the book, it’s off the Devon coast). Smith played the part of Daphne Castle, who runs the hotel. Trouble starts when an old friend of Daphne’s, Kenneth Marshall, brings his wife Arlena to the hotel for a holiday. As you’ll know if you’ve read the book, in the original story, it’s dress designer Rosamund Darnley who’s Kenneth Marshal’s friend. She doesn’t appear in the film. True to the novel, Arlena is murdered one day, and Hercule Poirot, who’s also at the hotel, investigates. Daphne Castle is necessarily involved, since the victim was one of the guests. While Smith didn’t win an award or nomination for her work in this film, she brought her trademark one-line ‘zingers’ and dry wit to the film.

Smith brought that same powerful presence and dry wit to her role as Professor Minerva McGonagall in the film adaptations of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series. Whether or not you’ve read the books, seen the films, or both, you’ll know that the stories take place at a fictional school of magic, Hogwarts, where young people learn to be wizards. The novels and films aren’t billed as crime fiction. However, there are plenty of crimes committed in them, including theft, murder, and abduction. Many people at Hogwarts are hiding secrets, and Professor McGonagall has her own past. Smith didn’t win awards or nominations for this role, but she is fondly remembered by legions of Harry Potter fans, and if you look at the events in the films, they have their share of crime.

In more recent years, Smith was known for her role in Downton Abbey as Lady Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham. This television series takes place in the early decades of the Twentieth Century, and it features the members of the ‘blueblood’ Crawley family and the staff of people who work for them. On the surface, the series doesn’t really seem to have much in common with a crime fiction series or film. But look below the surface, and that’s not so clear. In the course of the series, two members of the household get mixed up in murder cases. There is also forgery, theft, rape, and attempted blackmail, among other things. Those seem like crime-fictional things, at least to me. Of course, Lady Crawley would never stoop to committing crimes herself, but Smith made her character an indispensable, even iconic, part of life at Downton Abbey. We see Smith’s strong personality, razor-sharp wit, and ability to communicate much through things as simple as a facial expression. Little wonder she won multiple Emmy Awards and a BAFTA nomination for her work on that series.

Dame Maggie Smith made many contributions to the world of stage and screen, and arguably to crime fiction. Perhaps people don’t think of her as a crime fiction character, but she’s added to crime fiction adaptations. She is much missed.

*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from the Beatles’ Her Majesty.