Biography
Miriam Margoyles OBE (born May 18, 1941) is a British-Australian actress, writer, political activist and television personality, most prominent as a character actor on stage and screen. Her earliest roles were in theatre and, following a transition to film and television, she won a BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in The Age of Innocence (1993).
Known For
Complete Filmography

A Friend of Dorothy
2025
as Dorothy
A poignant short film that delves into the unexpected bond between Dorothy, an elderly woman living alone, and JJ, her young neighbor. When JJ’s footb...

Ken Dodd: A Legacy of Happiness
2025
A star-studded documentary revealing the private man behind one of Britain’s greatest comic geniuses, using home movies and extracts from notebooks th...

Alec Guinness: A Class Act
2024
as self
The story of one of Britain's most celebrated actors of the 20th century, told by those who knew and admired him.

The Real Ken Dodd: The Man I Loved
2024
as Narrator (voice)
Produced over four years with full access from Ken’s widow Lady Dodd, the film takes an in-depth look into Doddy’s private world, exploring the many s...
How To Make It In Comedy
2024
Told by the stars who first found fame at the Edinburgh Fringe, this the inside story of what it takes to make a name there, from those who enjoyed ov...

Doctor Who: 60th Anniversary Specials
2023
as The Meep (voice) (archive footage)
The Doctor finds himself with an old face and something is very wrong. How can Donna remember him and why has he got one of his old faces back? A comp...

Mog's Christmas
2023
as Aunt One (voice)
Mog feels a little ignored during the Thomas family's Christmas preparations. When she spots the huge Christmas tree, she freaks out and climbs to the...

Doctor Who: The Star Beast
2023
as Meep

Next to You
2023
as Granny Vera
Set five years on from the school days of director Stevan Filipovic's previous film Next to Me, a state of emergency exists and politicians are accuse...

Blackadder: A Cunning Story
2023
as Self – Narrator (voice)
A look back at the making of the entire Blackadder series to commemorate its 40th anniversary, featuring contributions from Blackadder's biggest fans ...

My Happy Ending
2023
as Judy
A famous actress goes incognito to seek treatment for a medical issue, and in a hospital waiting room she meets three remarkable women who help her fa...

Miriam's Dickensian Christmas
2022
as Self
Self-confessed Christmas Scrooge, Miriam Margolyes, turns to her love of Charles Dickens and the festive traditions in 'A Christmas Carol' to see if s...

David Baddiel: Jews Don't Count
2022
as Self
The writer and comedian looks at antisemitism and the progressive left. From theatre to football, Baddiel explores a political blindspot with Stephen ...

The Fringe, Fame and Me
2022
as Self
The Fringe, Fame and Me is the story of how a small Scottish arts festival that began 75 years ago this year became a national institution – a crucibl...

The Marvellous Maggie Smith: A Celebration
2022
as Self
A look at Dame Maggie Smith's life from a two-up two-down in Essex to Broadway and Hollywood. Starring in more than 60 films and 70 plays across her 7...

Judi Dench: Our National Treasure
2022
as Self
A profile of the actress from a strict Quaker upbringing in Yorkshire, through her staunch determination to make it as a thespian. There's also a look...

imagine... Miriam Margolyes: Up for Grabs
2022
as Self
Miriam Margolyes is one of Britain’s best loved and most provocative actresses. Across her eclectic career, she has played scene-stealing turns in Bla...

H Is for Happiness
2021
as Miss Bamford
A twelve-year-old girl with boundless optimism and a unique view of the world is inspired by the strange new boy at school, and sets out to mend her b...

Letters Live from the Archive: Freemasons’ Hall
2021
Inspired by "Letters of Note", the bestselling anthology compiled by Shaun Usher, and "To the Letter" by Simon Garfield, Letters Live is a series of c...

Wings
2020
as Audrey
A heartwarming love story that spans over six decades, between two Land Army girls during World War II.

Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears
2020
as Prudence Stanley
After freeing a young Bedouin girl from her unjust imprisonment in Jerusalem, an Australian adventuress, together with her devoted police detective fr...

The Last Artifact
2020
as Narrator (UK version)
Just outside Paris, France, inside a high-tech vault, requiring three independently controlled keys, rests a small metallic cylinder about the diamete...

Postcards from the 48%
2018
This is a film made by the some of the 48% who voted Remain. The film is of the 48% and for the 48%. It is their story, feelings and reasons for remai...

Early Man
2018
as Queen Oofeefa (voice)
Dug, along with his sidekick Hognob, unite a cavemen tribe to save their hidden valley from being spoiled and, all together as a team, to face the men...

Harry Potter: A History Of Magic
2017
as Herself
A thrilling journey through legends, belief and folklore, this film goes behind the scenes with the British Library as they search to tell that story ...

The Man Who Invented Christmas
2017
as Mrs. Fisk
In 1843, despite the fact that Dickens is a successful writer, the failure of his latest book puts his career at a crossroads, until the moment when, ...

The Little Vampire 3D
2017
as Wulftrud (voice)
Tony, a thirteen-year-old boy on vacation in rural Germany, is fascinated by the idea of vampires. Meanwhile Rudolph, a vampire of "similar" age (313!...

Roald Dahl's Most Marvellous Book
2016
as Self
In celebration of the 100th anniversary of Roald Dahl’s birth, film and television personalities take turns championing their favourite of Dahl's 10 b...
The Importance of Being Miriam
2015
Actress Miriam Margolyes reflects on the influences that shaped her career and shares her love of classic literature.
Spirit-ED
2015
as Headmistress - Ms Ursula Gressup
What if Angels went to school too? Spirit-ED is a magical, fantasy adventure set in Divinity, a school for guardian angels. Following the perilous adv...
Mother
2015
as Maria Aponte
Lara has always lived in the shadow of her mother. That is, until the morning of one life-changing decision that Lara knows, must be made alone.

The Legend of Longwood
2014
as Lady Thyrza
When 12-year-old Mickey Miller moves from New York to Ireland, she soon discovers a link between herself and the 300-year-old legend of the mysterious...
Outlier
2014
Cancer patient and successful writer Lilith Winterbottom should be dead by now. But the cynical misanthrope seems to scare even death away, in order t...

Maya the Bee Movie
2014
as Queen (voice)
A bubbly little bumblebee rebels against the rules of the hive to make all kinds of friends—from violin-playing grasshoppers to a hornet named Sting.

The Seventeenth Kind
2014
as Mrs. Mark
Black comedy scifi about a washed up TV presenter who doesn't let small things like alien invasions stop him from broadcasting.
Honeysuckle
2014
as Patricia
A short film about unity. This is a story about boy who finds an unlikely connection with his eccentric neighbour Patricia.

The Cow That Almost Missed Christmas
2012
as Mme Daniels / Mme Rat / Judith (voice)
Marjorie the cow lives in a run-down stable in the middle of Bethlehem. Nothing exciting ever happens in Bethlehem until now… there’s a census or some...

The Guilt Trip
2012
as Anita
An inventor and his mom hit the road together so he can sell his latest invention.

The Wedding Video
2012
as Patricia
When the rogueish but loveable Raif is asked to be his brother Tim's best man at his wedding, he decides the best present for the happy newlyweds woul...

A Closed Book
2012
as Mrs. Kilbride
Jane appears to be ideal: attractive, intelligent, unruffled by her employer's abrupt eccentricities. But, gradually, we come aware that Jane has anot...

Sir Billi
2012
as Baroness Chantal McToff (voice)
An aging, skateboarding veterinarian Sir Billi goes above and beyond the call of duty fighting villainous policemen and powerful lairds in a battle to...

When Harry Left Hogwarts
2011
as Self
BAFTA award-winning filmmaker Morgan Matthews was given unprecedented access to the behind-the-scenes of the final days of the final two Harry Potter ...

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
2011
as Pomona Sprout
Harry, Ron and Hermione continue their quest to vanquish the evil Voldemort once and for all. Just as things begin to look hopeless for the young wiza...

The Itch of the Golden Nit
2011
as Mummy Socks (voice)
Eleven-year-old Beanie's bland life is changed for ever when he is sent on a mission. Armed only with laser lip-gloss and a pair of blend-in pants he ...

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole
2010
as Mrs. Plithiver (voice)
When a young owl is abducted by an evil Owl army, he must escape with new-found friends and seek the legendary Guardians to stop the menace.

We Are Most Amused
2008
as Self
We Are Most Amused was a gala event held at the New Wimbledon Theatre on 12 November 2008 in honour of the 60th birthday of Charles, Prince of Wales, ...

Blackadder's Most Cunning Moments
2008
as Self
A countdown of the top 40 "Blackadder" moments chosen by cast and crew members, celebrity fans and 15 genuine Blackadders.

How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
2008
as Mrs. Kowalski
Sidney Young is a down-on-his-luck journalist. Thanks to a stint involving a pig and a glitzy awards ceremony, Sidney turns his fortunes around, attra...

The Dukes
2007
as Aunt Vee
The Dukes,a Doo Wop group, were on top of the world at 17, now are struggling for survival in 2008. Their manager is desperately trying to get them wo...

The 50 Greatest Television Dramas
2007
as Narrator (voice)
Boasting an amazing selection of the most watched, most influential and most highly acclaimed programmes ever made, The 50 Greatest Television Dramas ...

What the Pythons Did Next...
2007
as Narrator
A look at the careers of John Cleese, Eric Idle, Graham Chapman, Michael Palin, Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam in the years after Monty Python's Flying...

Happy Feet
2006
as Mrs. Astrakhan (voice)
Into the world of the Emperor Penguins, who find their soul mates through song, a penguin is born who cannot sing. But he can tap dance something fier...

Flushed Away
2006
as Rita's Grandma (voice)
London high-society mouse, Roddy is flushed down the toilet by Sid, a common sewer rat. Hang on for a madcap adventure deep in the sewer bowels of Rat...

Wallis & Edward
2005
as Aunt Bessie
In 1936, Edward VIII abdicated in order to marry the woman he loved, Wallis Simpson, a twice divorced American. These events caused a scandal around t...

Ladies in Lavender
2004
as Dorcas
Andrea, a gifted young Polish violinist from Krakow, is bound for America when he is swept overboard by a storm. When the Widdington sisters discover ...

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers
2004
as Peg Sellers
The turbulent personal and professional life of actor Peter Sellers (1925-1980), from his beginnings as a comic performer on BBC Radio to his huge suc...

Being Julia
2004
as Dolly de Vries
Julia Lambert is a true diva: beautiful, talented, weathly and famous. She has it all - including a devoted husband who has mastermined her brilliant...

Modigliani
2004
as Gertrude Stein
Set in Paris in 1919, biopic centers on the life of late Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani, focusing on his last days as well as his rivalry with Pablo...

Chasing Liberty
2004
as Maria
The President's daughter, unable to experience life like a normal 18 year-old, escapes from her entourage of Secret Service agents while traveling in ...

Undertaking Betty
2002
as Thelma & Selma
A politician's wife and the mortician who has secretly loved her for years plan to fake her death so they can run away together.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
2002
as Pomona Sprout
Cars fly, trees fight back, and a mysterious house-elf comes to warn Harry Potter at the start of his second year at Hogwarts. Adventure and danger aw...

Alone
2002
as Caseworker
Experience the fear as you're sucked into the disturbed mind of Alex. Tormented by harrowing voices of the past Alex searches for the one girl who can...

In Search of Peace
2001
as Ester Cailingold (voice)
In Search of Peace: 1948-1967 chronicles Israel's first two decades, offering new insights on the origins of the Middle East conflict. Combining a ric...

Cats & Dogs
2001
as Sophie the Castle Maid
When a professor develops a vaccine that eliminates human allergies to dogs, he unwittingly upsets the fragile balance of power between cats and dogs ...

Not Afraid, Not Afraid
2001
After being abandoned by her husband after 28 years, an overbearing, self-centered psychologist embarks on a quest to revisit her past loves, accompan...

House!
2000
as Auntie Beth
A small bingo hall is threatened by the opening of the country's largest bingo centre nearby.

Magnolia
1999
as Faye Barringer (uncredited)
On one random day in the San Fernando Valley, a dying father, a young wife, a male caretaker, a famous lost son, a police officer in love, a boy geniu...

End of Days
1999
as Mabel
On 28 December 1999, the citizens of New York City are getting ready for the turn of the millennium. However, Satan decides to crash the party by comi...

Dreaming of Joseph Lees
1999
as Signora Caldoni
Set in rural England in the 1950s Eva (Samantha Morton) fantasises about her handsome, worldly cousin Joseph Lees (Rupert Graves), with whom she fell ...

Sunshine
1999
as Rose Sonnenschein
The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.

The First Snow of Winter
1998
as Sean McDuck (voice)
Sean is a little duck with a big problem. Due to a mishap with a jet aircraft Sean misses the annual migration South and has to face the winter alone....

Babe: Pig in the City
1998
as Fly (voice)
Babe, fresh from his victory in the sheepherding contest, returns to Farmer Hoggett's farm, but after Farmer Hoggett is injured and unable to work, Ba...

Mulan
1998
as The Matchmaker (voice)
To save her father from certain death in the army, a young woman secretly enlists in his place and becomes one of China's greatest heroines in the pro...

The IMAX Nutcracker
1997
as Sugar Plum
This 37-minute 3-D Imax film adaptation from E.T.A. Hoffman's story is a straight narrative fantasy rather than a ballet. Little Clara receives a Chri...

The Long Way Home
1997
as (voice)
The story of the post World War II Jewish refugee situation from liberation to the establishment of the modern state of Israel.

Romeo + Juliet
1996
as Nurse
In director Baz Luhrmann's contemporary take on William Shakespeare's classic tragedy, the Montagues and Capulets have moved their ongoing feud to the...

Different for Girls
1996
as Pamela
Paul and Kim meet when their vehicles collide. Paul is fascinated with the attractive Kim. It turns out that the two were childhood friends in Catholi...

James and the Giant Peach
1996
as Aunt Sponge / Glowworm (voice)
When the young orphan boy James spills a magic bag of crocodile tongues, he finds himself in possession of a giant peach that flies him away to strang...

Balto
1995
as Grandma Rosy
An outcast half-wolf risks his life to prevent a deadly epidemic from ravaging Nome, Alaska.

Babe
1995
as Fly (voice)
Babe is a little pig who doesn't quite know his place in the world. With a bunch of odd friends, like Ferdinand the duck who thinks he is a rooster an...

Cold Comfort Farm
1995
as Mrs. Beetle
In this adaptation of the satirical British novel, Flora Poste, a plucky London society girl orphaned at age 19, finds a new home with some rough rela...

Immortal Beloved
1994
as Nanette Streicherová
A chronicle of the life of infamous classical composer Ludwig van Beethoven and his painful struggle with hearing loss. Following Beethoven's death in...

Liberation
1994
as Narrator
Liberation tells the dramatic story of the battle waged on two fronts during World War II - the Allied campaign to liberate Europe and Hitler's genoci...

The Thief and the Cobbler
1993
as Maiden from Mombassa (voice)
It is written among the limitless constellations of the celestial heavens, and in the depths of the emerald seas, and upon every grain of sand in the...

The Age of Innocence
1993
as Mrs. Catherine Mingott
In 19th century New York high society, a young lawyer falls in love with a woman separated from her husband, while he is engaged to the woman's cousin...

Ed and His Dead Mother
1993
as Mabel Chilton
A mourning son makes a deal to reanimate his one year dead mother, however things turn into an unexpected direction.

Demonella
1993
as Mother
Music producer Arnold Silverstein is desperate for a song hit so when the Devil - a woman - supplies him with the answer to his dreams, a piece called...

Stalin
1992
as Krupskaya
The life and career of the brutal Soviet dictator, Josef Stalin. Through the eyes and memories of Anna Aliluyeva, Stalin’s granddaughter, the film tra...

As You Like It
1992
as Audrey
Hiding out in an industrial wasteland from the murderous wrath of a regional ruler, a woman, disguised as a boy, gives wooing lessons to the edgy lad ...

The Butcher's Wife
1991
as Gina
A clairvoyant woman thinks that she's met her future husband because she's seen him in a dream. They marry and he takes her back to his butcher shop i...

Dead Again
1991
as Hypnotism Patient
In 1949, composer Roman Strauss is executed for the murder of his wife. In 1990s Los Angeles, a detective comes across a mute amnesiac woman who is so...

Echoes That Remain
1991
as Narrator (voice)
Echoes That Remain combines hundreds of rare archival photos and previously unseen film footage with live action sequences shot on location at the sit...
The Fool
1990
as Mrs. Bowring
A costume drama / satire about financial skull-duggery, and confidence tricksters in both the upper and lower classes in Victorian London. A working c...

Pacific Heights
1990
as Realtor
A couple works hard to renovate their dream house and become landlords to pay for it. Unfortunately one of their tenants has plans of his own.

The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship
1990
as Mother / Mrs. Woodcutter
Based on a Russian folk tale. A proclamation went out through all the land that whosoever could build a flying ship would win the hand of the Tsar's d...

Orpheus Descending
1990
as Vee Talbot
Val Xavier is a drifter in 1940's Mississippi who brings new life to an Italian immigrant woman trapped in a loveless marriage.

I Love You to Death
1990
as Joey's Mother
Joey Boca is the owner of a pizza parlour, and has been married to Rosalie for years. When Rosalie discovers that Joey is a womanizer and has been che...

Old Flames
1990
as Nellie
Daniel is an obeying and high-flying barrister with the good life on his side. Nathaniel Quass is a rich and bizarre recluse, generous, obsessed and ...

Unexplained Laughter
1989
as Laughter (voice)
Lydia is unlucky in love and retreats to the Welsh countryside with her friend Betty. But the beautiful scenery holds its own humour and passion.

Murderers Among Us: The Simon Wiesenthal Story
1989
as Mrs. Rajzman
A biographical portrayal of Simon Wiesenthal, famous Nazi Hunter. From his imprisonment in a Nazi Concentration Camp, the film follows his liberation ...

Blackadder's Christmas Carol
1988
as Queen Victoria
After a genial spirit shows the benevolent Ebenezer Blackadder visions of his unscrupulous ancestors, he resolves to mend his generous ways.

Little Dorrit
1987
as Flora Finching
A drama based on the novel by Charles Dickens which tells the story of Arthur Clennam who is thrown into a debtor's prison. There he meets a young sea...

Body Contact
1987
as Tony's Mother
In the future, around Tottenham and Hackney, taxi driver Smiley comes to the assistance of the beautiful Dominique Renoir, who's on the run from her v...

Little Shop of Horrors
1986
as Dental Nurse
Seymour Krelborn is a nerdy orphan working at Mushnik's; a flower shop in urban Skid Row. He harbors a crush on fellow co-worker, Audrey Fulquard, and...

Scotch & Wry
1986
Video Compilation of the Scottish TV Comedy Sketch Show. Stand out characters include Supercop, an idiot motorcycle policeman whose catchphrase was 'A...
The Secret Diaries of the Film Censors
1986
as Miss N. Shortt
A dramatized documentary looking at how the British Board of Film Censors imposed an extraordinary stranglehold over the content of British cinema in ...

The Good Father
1985
as Jane Powell
Bill is a man who's very bitter about his divorce and losing custody of his son. So, when one of his friends is being sued for divorce by his wife so ...

Morons from Outer Space
1985
as Doctor Wallace
The story begins on a small spaceship docking with a refueling station. On board are a group of four aliens, Bernard, Sandra, Desmond, and Julian. Dur...

Electric Dreams
1984
as Ticket Girl
Miles buys himself a state-of-the-art computer that starts expressing thoughts and emotions after having champagne spilled on it. Things start getting...

Yentl
1983
as Sarah
In a time when girls were forbidden to study religious scriptures, a Jewish girl masquerades as a boy to enter religious training and unexpectedly fin...

Frida Kahlo & Tina Modotti
1983
as (voice)
An unconventional portrait of painter Frida Kahlo and photographer Tina Modotti. Simple in style but complex in its analysis, it explores the divergen...

Scrubbers
1982
as Jones
Inmates fight, pair off, try suicide and attempt escape at a British reform school for girls.

Reds
1981
as Woman with Notebook (uncredited)
An account of the revolutionary years of the legendary American journalist John Reed, who shared his adventurous professional life with his radical co...

The Apple
1980
as Landlady
In a pseudo-futuristic 1994, a square couple enter the corrupt world of the music industry, and subsequently a maze of drugs, sex, and temptation.

The Awakening
1980
as Dr. Kadira
When a British archaeologist violates an Egyptian queen's tomb, her evil spirit enters his daughter.

On a Paving Stone Mounted
1978
An impressionistic look at Irish emigrants in London, representing the emigrant's journey, a confusion of anticipation, memories and experience.

The Thin End of the Wedge
1977
as Veronica
A student faced with an ultimatum to find £5 by morning - or lose his girlfriend - searches for friends he can tap and discovers that the crises in th...

Confessions from a Holiday Camp
1977
as Blackbird (voice) (uncredited)
Timmy Lea and his brother-in-law Sidney Noggett are working as entertainment officers at Funfrall, a typical British holiday camp. The staff are lazy ...

Stand up, Virgin Soldiers
1977
as Elephant Ethel
Some British soldiers in Singapore are more concerned with finding sex than finding Communists.
The Lifeswappers
1976
as Miriam/Miss Babberton
Who would you be if you could choose? Princess Anne? Linda Lovelace? The Prime Minister? Since things are already so bad for Trevor – rotten job, bitc...

The Battle of Billy's Pond
1976
as Tour Guide
A huge chemical company pays illegal dumpers for disposal of chemical waste dangerous to the environment.
Naughty Girls
1975
as Voice
A travelogue depicting the adventures of English girls when they visit the Far East.

Rime of the Ancient Mariner
1975
A two-part program that examines the life of Samuel Coleridge from his orphaned childhood to how his friendship with William and Dorothy Wordsworth in...

On the Game
1974
as Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Comic look at the history of prostitution.

A Nice Girl Like Me
1969
as Pensione
Candy is a fetching unwed young lady with a penchant for pregnancy. Her adventures begin when she leaves her sheltered boarding school background for ...
The Ha-Ha
1969
as Kathie
A young woman has a mental breakdown in a state institution.

Holy Days
N/A
Three quirky older nuns hit the road looking for miracles but end up learning to drive like demons instead. When the last of the sisters of St. Suzann...
Angels in the Asylum
N/A
In early 1900s Surrey, fifty women labeled as typhoid carriers face unjust confinement at Long Grove Asylum. Isolated and stigmatized, they endure har...