Maggie Smith, the venerable British actress whose career on stage, film and television spanned more than 60 years, has died. She was 89.

Her sons, Chris Larkin and Toby Stephens, confirmed she had died in a statement to the Press Association.

Having appeared in more than 50 films, Smith was considered one of Britain’s best-known actresses and was loved by recent generations for her roles as Professor Minerva McGonagall in the ‘Harry Potter’ films and the Dowager Countess of Grantham in the television series ‘Downton Abbey’.

In addition to winning two Academy Awards, Smith earned five BAFTA Awards, four Emmy Awards, three Golden Globes, five Screen Actors Guild Awards and a Tony Award. In 1990 she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

Born in Ilford, Essex, Smith moved to Oxford with her family when she was four years old. Her father, a public health pathologist, worked at the University of Oxford. Smith attended Oxford High School until the age of 16, when she left to study acting at the Oxford Playhouse.

In 1952 she made her stage debut with the Oxford University Drama Society. Ten years later, she starred opposite Laurence Olivier and earned her first Oscar nomination for 1965’s “Othello.”

In 1970, she had won her first Oscar for “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.” Another followed in 1979 for ‘California Suite’.

Smith appeared in several films in the 1980s and 1990s, including 1985’s “A Room with a View” and the 1993 comedy “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit” with Whoopi Goldberg. But she became a global star in the fall of her career after starring in the “Harry Potter” film franchise, which ran from 2001 to 2011.

In 2010, she was cast as the witty Dowager Countess in “Downton Abbey,” which won her a slew of awards, including three Emmys and a Golden Globe.

The actress battled and defeated breast cancer while starring in the Harry Potter films.

She welcomed two children, Larkin and Stephens, from her first marriage to actor Robert Stephens. Smith’s second husband, playwright and screenwriter Beverley Cross, died in 1998.

Smith is survived by her sons and five grandchildren.