Hodge made her professional stage debut in the
Howard Barker play
No-One Was Saved at the
Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, in 1971. She made her
West End debut in
Rookery Nook in 1972 and worked with
Bob Fosse in 1973 on
Pippin. However, when applying for television work, she found she had become classed as a theatre actress. Having made the breakthrough in the role of Phyllida (Trant) Erskine-Brown in
Rumpole of the Bailey, she found when trying to make the occasional return to theatre work that she had been classed as a television actress. She has appeared in roles in
The Naked Civil Servant opposite
John Hurt, shortly after she featured in the BBC 2 1975 Christmas production
Great Big Groovy Horse, a rock opera based on the story of the Trojan Horse starring
Julie Covington,
Bernard Cribbins and
Paul Jones. It was repeated on BBC1 in 1977. She featured as Myra Arundel in the 1984 BBC version of
Noël Coward's
Hay Fever, as
Margaret Thatcher in
The Falklands Play, and in 2007 as Betty, the wife of tycoon
Robert Maxwell, in the BBC TV drama
Maxwell opposite
David Suchet. She took the female lead in the 1983 film,
Betrayal (based on
Harold Pinter's play
Betrayal), a
roman à clef derived from the playwright's affair with broadcaster
Joan Bakewell. She was nominated for a
BAFTA for her role in a television adaptation of
Anita Brookner's
Hotel du Lac in 1987, and was awarded the
Laurence Olivier Theatre Award in 2000 for
Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the production of
Money at the
National Theatre. She bought the rights of the book
Portrait of a Marriage and is credited with developing
a TV series of the same name in association with the BBC in 1990 adapted by writer
Penelope Mortimer. She co-starred with Dame
Judi Dench in the 1995 London revival of
Stephen Sondheim's
A Little Night Music, at the National Theatre, as Countess Charlotte Malcolm. In 2003, Hodge featured in
His Dark Materials, one of
Nicholas Hytner's early productions as its Artistic Director, her third role on the Olivier Theatre stage. Hodge is an Honorary Graduate (DLitt) of
Brunel University and one of the founder members of the Brunel Club. From 2009 to 2015, she played a comedy role in the BBC sitcom
Miranda, as the mother of the eponymous main character. Hodge reprised the role alongside the rest of the cast for the 2017
Royal Variety Performance. In 2012 she toured in Christopher Luscombe's revival of
Dandy Dick, starring alongside
Nicholas Le Prevost. She is Joint President of Grimsby's Caxton Theatre and a Trustee of
LAMDA, her alma mater. In 2008, she guest-starred in an episode of
Hustle within the 4th series, playing the character of Veronica Powell. After the BBC commissioned the show for a 5th series in February 2008, it was planned Hodge would make an additional appearance; however, due to on-set filming issues, the episode her character would have appeared in was never finished, and subsequently never aired. The release of the 5th series was delayed as a result. In 2018, Hodge played Ursula, the mother of Liberal MP and party leader Jeremy Thorpe (played by
Hugh Grant) in BBC Television's
A Very English Scandal. In April 2021, it was announced that Hodge would play the role of Mrs. Pumphrey in the television series
All Creatures Great and Small, taking over from
Diana Rigg, who had died the previous year. Delayed for a year from autumn 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Hodge was invited by Nigel Havers to star opposite him in
Noël Coward's
Private Lives, the inaugural production of the Nigel Havers Theatre Company, directed by one of her previous collaborators Christopher Luscombe. Hodge was appointed an
Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the
2017 Birthday Honours for services to drama. In December 2025 Hodge played
Mrs Malaprop in
The Rivals, to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the
Richard Brinsley Sheridan play, at the
Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond, London. ==Filmography==