(Photo: Getty Images)

Later this month Dame Maggie Smith is teaming up with fellow acting greats Sir Ian McKellen, Dame Judi Dench, Sir Derek Jacobi, and Sir Kenneth Branagh for a charity Zoom event that's being billed as an evening of "banter outrageous and laughter contagious, with live Q&A throughout." It's safe to expect some memorable theatrical anecdotes and a few affectionate zingers between these old friends.

To whet your appetite, we thought we'd make this great Dame our British Icon of the Week. She's one of only 62 people to have been appointed to the Order of the Companions of Honour by Queen Elizabeth II for "having a major contribution to the arts, science, medicine, or government lasting over a long period of time." Here are 10 other things we love about the talented actress.

1. Her performance in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is one of the most revered in British cinema.

Smith won Oscar and BAFTA awards for her role as the domineering Scottish schoolteacher, who is adamant that she can mold "my girls" into the "crème de la crème." When RuPaul says "bring back my girls" at the finale of every Drag Race episode, he's homaging Smith's iconic performance.

2. She tells it like is – especially when it comes to her own career.

Smith's high-profile roles as the Dowager Countess in Downton Abbey and Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter movies won her a whole new fanbase, but she doesn't quite consider them career highlights. "I am deeply grateful for the work in Potter and indeed Downton but it wasn’t what you’d call satisfying," she told London's Evening Standard last year, adding: "I didn't really feel I was acting in those things."

3. She's been friends with Dame Judi Dench since the 1950s.

"Jude is the most incredibly level person: generous, understanding," Smith told The Guardian in 2004. "All the things I'd have to work very hard at, Jude is like all the time. I would love to be like that. And working with Jude you have to try to remember that you ought to be like that."

4. She's also friends with Samuel L. Jackson – though they're yet to work together.

“I still want to do a scene with Maggie Smith,” Jackson told People in 2017. “Maggie’s one of my favorite people. We hang out or go to dinner.”

Wouldn't you like to be a fly in the wall at that restaurant?

5. She and Sir Ian McKellen share a passion for tennis.

When the two thesps attended the 2017 Wimbledon tennis championships, their photos together delighted the internet.

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6. Smith is fully aware that McKellen keeps doing an impression of her, but she recently got her own back.

Smith told London's Evening Standard that she was hoping to catch McKellen's one-man show, then added: "But I’ll run the risk of him doing an impersonation of me. He does them all the time. I rather acidly told him that I’d done one of him but people didn’t know him well enough to recognize it."

7. She's one of only 24 performers to have completed the "Triple Crown of Acting" by winning Emmy, Oscar, and Tony Awards.

Smith has two Oscars (for 1969's The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and 1978's California Suite), a Tony (for 1990's Lettice and Lovage), and four Emmys (for 2003's My House in Umbria and three for Downton Abbey in 2011, 2012, and 2016).

8. When Jimmy Kimmel made a joke about Smith failing to attend the 2016 Emmys to collect her award in person, she responded rather gamely.

"I was very astonished and pleased to win the award. I feel the Emmys have been overly generous to me," Smith said in a statement. "If Mr. Kimmel could please direct me to the lost and found office I will try and be on the next flight. Love, Old Maggie."

9. She rarely gives TV interviews, but when she does, they're terrific fun.

During her 2015 appearance on The Graham Norton Show, Smith shared an adorable story about being recognized by a small child at her local market, and gave her best withering glare when asked about Downton Abbey – a show she claims to have never watched.

10. But obviously, she delivered all the best one-liners in Downton Abbey.

Who can forget the priceless, "What is a weekend?"

Do you have a favorite Dame Maggie Smith moment or performance?