It’s a rare thing to see a legend break. But on a chilly Saturday afternoon at the Cheltenham Literature Festival, the unthinkable happened: Dame Judi Dench, the indomitable queen of stage and screen, the woman who has weathered decades of triumph and heartbreak with a wry smile and a stiff upper lip, broke down in tears. The auditorium held its breath as the 89-year-old actress, beloved by millions, was brought to her knees—not by age, not by illness, but by the grief of losing her closest friend, Dame Maggie Smith.
The moment unfolded with the quiet intimacy of a family tragedy, broadcast to a room full of strangers. Dench, on stage with her longtime collaborator Brendan O’Hea, had been in fine spirits, regaling the audience with stories from her storied career, laughter bubbling up like champagne. But when O’Hea, his own voice gentle and apologetic, broached the subject of grief—of the loss of not just Maggie Smith, but also Barbara Le Hunt, another D3ar friend and co-star—something shifted in the air. “I know I probably shouldn’t bring this up,” he began, “I know the last week has been tricky for you because you lost your great friends, Maggie Smith and Barbara Le Hunt.” The words hung between them, heavy as stone.
For a moment, Dench seemed to gather herself, the consummate performer preparing for another scene. She tried to answer, to explain the peculiar ache of grief, comparing it to a wound that never quite heals, a hole that cannot be filled. “I suppose because the… that’s created by grief…” she began, her voice faltering. But then the tears came—quiet at first, then unstoppable. The audience, so used to seeing her command every stage, every camera, every room, watched in stunned silence as Judi Dench, the woman who has played queens and warriors and the sharpest minds in the business, was undone by the simplest, oldest pain in the world: the loss of a friend.
It is impossible to overstate what Maggie Smith meant to Judi Dench. Their friendship spanned more than 70 years, tracing all the way back to the dusty corridors of the Old Vic Theatre in 1950s London. They were young then, both hungry for the stage, both determined to make their mark. Together, they weathered the storms of the British theatre, shared dressing rooms and opening nights, swapped secrets and jokes, and consoled each other through the slings and arrows of the business. They were rivals, yes, but only in the way sisters are rivals—each pushing the other to be better, braver, more daring.
Their careers ran in parallel, two titans moving through the decades with grace and fire. They appeared together on stage and screen, their chemistry electric, their respect for each other palpable. In 2018, they starred together in the documentary “Nothing Like a Dame,” along with Joan Plowright and Eileen Atkins, serving up a masterclass in wit, wisdom, and the kind of friendship that can only be forged in the crucible of a lifetime’s work. They laughed, they bickered, they reminisced about the old days. It was a love letter to the theatre, and to each other.
But now, Maggie is gone. She died in hospital last month, aged 89, her passing marking the end of an era. The tributes poured in from around the world—Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, and a generation of actors who grew up in her shadow. But for Judi, the loss was personal, crushing, irreparable. “It’s like losing a limb,” she once said of grief, and watching her on that stage, you could see the truth of it in every trembling line of her face.
Barbara Le Hunt’s D3ath, too, was a blow. She and Dench had worked together on the beloved BBC sitcom “As Time Goes By,” their on-screen rapport mirrored in a deep off-screen affection. Le Hunt died in September, aged 88, leaving Dench to mourn another piece of her past slipping away. The world may see Dame Judi Dench as an icon, but in these moments, she is simply a woman who has outlived too many of her friends.
As O’Hea pressed gently for her thoughts on grief, Dench tried to articulate what it means to lose so much, so late in life. She has compared grief to a “patrol”—a guard that never leaves its post, a constant companion. “I suppose because the… that’s created by grief…” she began, but the words failed her. Tears ran down her cheeks, her shoulders shook, and the audience—many of them in tears themselves—watched as one of the greatest actresses of her generation was rendered, for a moment, utterly human.
That is the cruel trick of old age: the longer you live, the more you lose. Dench has spoken before about the loneliness that comes with outliving your contemporaries, the ache of seeing the faces you love disappear one by one. “You don’t know how much of it is left,” she has said, her voice tinged with both fear and gratitude. And yet, she soldiers on, refusing to let sorrow define her final act.
Her own health battles have been well documented. Dench suffers from age-related macular degeneration, a condition that has robbed her of much of her sight. She can no longer read scripts, can no longer drive, can no longer see the faces of the audience that has adored her for so long. But she adapts, relying on her photographic memory, on friends and colleagues who read her lines aloud, on sheer force of will. “I don’t want to retire,” she told documentary presenter Louis Theroux in 2022. “I’m not doing much at the moment because I can’t… can’t see. It’s bad.” But even as her world narrows, she refuses to let go of the work that gives her life meaning.
That same determination is what has carried her through the loss of Maggie Smith. Their last collaboration, “Ladies in Lavender,” was a gentle, heartbreaking tale of two sisters who find a young man washed up on a Cornish beach. It was a film about love, about loss, about the quiet heroism of carrying on when the world seems determined to break your heart. It was, in many ways, a reflection of their own friendship—full of warmth, humor, and the kind of unspoken understanding that only comes from a lifetime spent together.
Now, Dench is left to carry the torch alone. The world mourns with her, but none can truly understand the depth of her loss. In a business that is often fickle and cruel, Dench and Smith found in each other a rare constancy—a friendship that endured not just the pressures of fame, but the ravages of time. They were each other’s North Star, a reminder that even in the darkest hours, there is light to be found.
As the festival audience sat in silence, watching Dench struggle to compose herself, there was a sense that something profound was happening. Here was a woman who has given everything to her craft, who has played every role, won every award, and yet is still vulnerable to the simplest, most universal pain of all. Here was a reminder that grief does not discriminate, that even the strongest among us are brought low by the loss of those we love.
But there was also, in that moment, a kind of hope. Dench’s tears were not just for herself, but for all of us—for everyone who has ever loved and lost, for everyone who has faced the long, lonely road of grief. In showing her pain, she gave us permission to feel our own, to acknowledge the wounds that never quite heal.
In the days that followed, tributes to Maggie Smith continued to flood in. Fans remembered her as Professor McGonagall, as the Dowager Countess, as the sharpest tongue in British theatre. But for Dench, she was simply Maggie—her friend, her confidante, her partner in crime. “There’s nothing like a Dame,” the old song goes, and now there is one less in the world.
As for Dench, she will carry on, as she always has. There will be more performances, more interviews, more moments of laughter and light. But something essential has changed. The world is a little dimmer, the stage a little emptier. And yet, in her grief, Dench has given us a final, priceless gift: the reminder that love endures, even after D3ath. That friendship, once forged, can never truly be lost. That even in the face of unimaginable loss, we can find the strength to carry on.
So here’s to Dame Judi Dench, and to Dame Maggie Smith. To the laughter they shared, the battles they fought, the legacy they leave behind. Here’s to the tears, and to the courage it takes to shed them in public. Here’s to the power of friendship, and to the enduring magic of two women who changed the world, one performance at a time.
In the end, perhaps that is the greatest lesson of all. That even as the lights go down, as the curtain falls, as the friends we love slip away, the love remains. And in that love, there is hope. In that love, there is life. And in that love, there is Judi Dench—still standing, still fighting, still, somehow, finding the strength to smile through the tears.
