‘Downton Abbey” star Dame Maggie Smith lives up to her cranky on-screen reputation in an upcoming interview on “60 Minutes.”
Smith, who plays snarky dowager Lady Grantham on the popular PBS drawing-room series, says she hasn’t even seen the show — and admits that co-workers consider her “scary.”
“I don’t sit down and watch it,” Smith, 78, tells Steve Kroft in the interview, airing this Sunday night.
But she says there’s a good reason for that.
“I always see things that I would like to do differently and think, ‘Oh, why in the name of God did I do that?’ ”
Smith agrees with the perception that she’s a “perfectionist” — and attributes this to her age. “You’re trying to say that I am what everybody says . . . I’m scary and I understand that totally,” Smith says.
“Old people are scary and I have to face it, I am old and I am scary and I am very sorry about it but I don’t know what you do.”
She’s also unimpressed at her late-in-life celebrity — despite an acting career that’s included two Oscars, three Emmys and a Tony Award.
“I don’t feel any different to the way I felt before and I’m not quite sure what [being a star] means,” she says.
“I am familiar to people now . . . That is entirely due to the television set.”