Julian Fellowes , a British actor-turned-writer-producer (and actual Lord), has a best original screenplay Oscar on his shelf for the 2001 murder mystery Gosford Park . The film was a hit in Hollywood and beyond, with the likes of Charles Dance, Stephen Fry, Michael Gambon, Helen Mirren, Richard E. Grant and Kristin Scott Thomas dazzling in the countryside-set whodunnit.

It was here, 25 years ago, Fellowes befriended beloved English actress Maggie Smith . “She saved my bacon a few times,” Fellowes recalls to The Hollywood Reporter about the late legend of stage and screen. He references a particular line of Smith’s that director Robert Altman wasn’t quite sure worked. Fellowes had deemed it one of his best, but soon found it speeding toward the chopping block. Until Smith stepped i

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