She came to national attention following World War II in the film adaptations of Noël Coward's Blithe Spirit, and Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest.

Released to travel under his family's supervision, he murdered his father, the Reverend Julius Benn, a Congregational Church minister, by bludgeoning him to death with a chamber pot, before slashing his own throat with a pocket knife at an inn in Matlock, Derbyshire on 4 March 1883.

Hoping to start a new life far from the scene of their recent troubles, the Rutherfords emigrated to Madras, India, but Margaret was sent back to Britain when she was three years old to live with her aunt Bessie Nicholson in Wimbledon, South London, after her pregnant mother hanged herself from a tree.

As her "spaniel jowls" and bulky frame made being cast in romantic heroine roles impossible, she established her name in comedy, appearing in many of the most successful British plays and films.

[5] Rutherford made her first appearance in London's West End in 1933, but her talent was not recognised by the critics until her performance as Miss Prism in John Gielgud's production of The Importance of Being Earnest at the Globe Theatre in 1939.

Rutherford received rave reviews from audiences and critics alike for her lusty portrayal of the bumbling medium Madame Arcati, a role for which Coward had envisioned her.

"[6] Another theatrical success during the war years included her part as the sinister housekeeper Mrs. Danvers in Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca at the Queen's Theatre in 1940.

Her jaunty performance, cycling about the Kent countryside, head held high, back straight, and cape fluttering behind her, established the model for portraying that role thereafter.

She reprised her stage roles of the headmistress alongside Alastair Sim in The Happiest Days of Your Life (1950) and Miss Prism in Anthony Asquith's film adaptation of The Importance of Being Earnest (1952).

More comedies followed, including Castle in the Air (1952) with David Tomlinson, Trouble in Store (1953), with Norman Wisdom, The Runaway Bus (1954) with Frankie Howerd and An Alligator Named Daisy (1955) with Donald Sinden and Diana Dors.

Rutherford worked with Norman Wisdom again in Just My Luck (1957) and co-starred in The Smallest Show on Earth with Virginia McKenna, Peter Sellers and Leslie Phillips (both 1957).

In the early 1960s, she appeared as Miss Jane Marple in a series of four George Pollock films loosely based on novels by Agatha Christie.

[13] Many of Britain's top actors, including Sir John Gielgud, Sir Ralph Richardson, Dame Flora Robson and Joyce Grenfell, attended a memorial Service of Thanksgiving at the Actors' Church, St. Paul's, Covent Garden, on 21 July 1972, where 90-year-old Dame Sybil Thorndike praised her friend's enormous talent and recalled that Rutherford had "never said anything horrid about anyone".

"A Blithe Spirit" is inscribed on the base of Margaret Rutherford's memorial stone, a reference to the Noël Coward play that helped to make her name.

The English PEN International Centre included several readings of poems by Rutherford on a list entitled Library of Recordings.pdf Archived 8 August 2014 at the Wayback Machine (1953).