Miriam Margolyes, OBE (/ˈmÉ'Ë rÉ¡É™liË z/; born 18 May 1941) is an
English-Australian character actress and comedian. Her earliest roles
were in theatre; after several supporting roles in film and
television, she won a BAFTA Award for her role in Martin Scorsese's
The Age of Innocence (1993) and was cast in the role of Professor
Sprout in the Harry Potter film series.Margolyes has spent many years
dividing her time between the United Kingdom, Australia, and Italy.
She has starred in productions in both the United Kingdom and
Australia, including the Australian premiere of the 2013 play I'll Eat
You Last. She became an Australian citizen in 2013.Margolyes was born
in Oxford on 18 May 1941, the only child of Ruth (née Walters;
1905â€"1974), an English property investor and developer, and Joseph
Margolyes (1899â€"1995), a Scottish physician from the Gorbals area of
Glasgow. She grew up in a Jewish family, with ancestors who moved to
the UK from Belarus and Poland. Her great-grandfather, Symeon
Sandmann, was born in the Polish town of Margonin, which Margolyes
visited in 2013. She attended Oxford High School and Newnham College,
Cambridge, where she read English. There, in her 20s, she began acting
and appeared in productions by the Cambridge Footlights. She
represented Newnham College in the first series of University
Challenge, where she may have been one of the first people to say
"fuck" on British television; she claims to have used the word in
frustration on the show in 1963.[a]
English-Australian character actress and comedian. Her earliest roles
were in theatre; after several supporting roles in film and
television, she won a BAFTA Award for her role in Martin Scorsese's
The Age of Innocence (1993) and was cast in the role of Professor
Sprout in the Harry Potter film series.Margolyes has spent many years
dividing her time between the United Kingdom, Australia, and Italy.
She has starred in productions in both the United Kingdom and
Australia, including the Australian premiere of the 2013 play I'll Eat
You Last. She became an Australian citizen in 2013.Margolyes was born
in Oxford on 18 May 1941, the only child of Ruth (née Walters;
1905â€"1974), an English property investor and developer, and Joseph
Margolyes (1899â€"1995), a Scottish physician from the Gorbals area of
Glasgow. She grew up in a Jewish family, with ancestors who moved to
the UK from Belarus and Poland. Her great-grandfather, Symeon
Sandmann, was born in the Polish town of Margonin, which Margolyes
visited in 2013. She attended Oxford High School and Newnham College,
Cambridge, where she read English. There, in her 20s, she began acting
and appeared in productions by the Cambridge Footlights. She
represented Newnham College in the first series of University
Challenge, where she may have been one of the first people to say
"fuck" on British television; she claims to have used the word in
frustration on the show in 1963.[a]
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