Ian McKellen

Yay, finally done. I imagine this will read slightly strangely because to try and relate Sir Ian's facial expressions, and audience reactions to various (and many) lines would have been too much. So if it reads odd or terse in any way, that's my fault because the interview was extremely jovial.


Ian McKellen on Parkinson - April 12th 2003

Other guests: Comedian, Paul Merton and actor Jerome Flynn (in character as Tommy Cooper).

Michael Parkinson: Were you a (Tommy) Cooper fan?

Ian McKellen: (cupping Jerome Flynn's face) aww, look at it - Isn't he lovely?
(Getting to the question) Well, like you, didn't you go a musical when you were a kid?

P: Yes

I: So did I and I only saw Tommy Cooper once In Manchester that I took my aunt In. What do I remember about it? Just the mayhem at the end and everything on the floor, covered in props. There was a story that he'd taken a taxi back to Piccadilly station to get back to London, and at the end of the journey, given the cabbie an envelope and said 'have a drink on me'. And when he'd gone, the cabbie opened it up and inside there was a teabag.

P: There aren't too many generous comedians, it's a trait they seem to have actually, they're all fairly cautious.

I: And brave.

P: And brave.

I: I mean all, you were saying earlier on, all actors who've learnt a script know how brave a comedian Is whether he's got a script or not, to stand there, because adlib and improvisation is the essence of it, isn't it?

P: Now what about the play you're in, Dance of Death, Strindberg. Now I read somewhere that this was the part you really coveted, the part you wanted to play.

I: Yeah, I've never had a long list of parts I've wanted to play but ever since I saw Lawrence Olivier play It at the National Theatre - he was understudied by Anthony Hopkins who had a non-speaking part In the production - I wanted to do it, simply because he was so tremendous and I could see it was a great, great part. You get to do all sorts of things that actors like to do, like being drunk, and dying, dancing at one point, some good one-liners and all sorts of things like that. But I always wanted to play it when the choice came and so I did it.

P: And there's some comedy in it isn't there? It's always thought to be a rather somber piece but there is comedy there.

I: Strindberg, It was written 100 years ago, and August Strindberg who wrote 67 plays has a very bad reputation outside Sweden as being a very gloomy man indeed and hating women and so on.
This play is about a marriage that is just coming up for its 25th wedding anniversary, and the couple hate everything about the world including each other which means quite a lot of comedy from people who are observing It. Course, to be in a marriage like that is hell and they call it hell, but for the observers, even as you are cringing, you're finding It amusing. And we were rewarded by the director of the Swedish National Theatre Company coming to see the play in its first week and saying 'at last, a non-Swedish production of our great writer Strindberg that realizes he was actually funny'.

P: You said you saw Olivier playing the part of your ambition - how big an impression did he leave on you?

I: (laughing) I realize I've got a very faulty memory about the performance - it was 30 years ago - but I do remember a particularly telling moment when he came onto the stage on his own with a kitten, with a cat. And I can see him now coming down the stage - of course the audience are riveted: 'what's this cat doing in this play suddenly?' - and he came down stage right and suddenly looked at the audience and turned and threw the cat right across the stage and out the window.
Well, it was electrifying! I couldn't wait to get to this moment, you know: I was going to get to throw the cat! How was it done, which cat, and all that.
So I began to consult people who'd been involved in that production that I remembered and Edward _____ - a good mate of mine who was playing a non-speaking part along with Tony Hopkins - was in the wings. I said 'now, how did Larry throw the cat?'. He said 'he never threw the cat. It was my job in the wings to receive the cat from him, so he couldn't have thrown it because I got it'.
Oh, so I thought I'd misremembered. I went to see Maggie Smith In her play the other week, I said 'Maggie, do you remember Larry doing Dance of Death.
*Ian affects Maggie Smith's voice* - 'Oh, yes, yes. Chewing up the scenery and throwing the cat'.
Throwing the cat?
'Oh yes, he threw the cat right of the window'.
Well, I was sure he threw the cat.
(end of Maggie Smith impersonations)
In the first week of the run here Joan Plowright, Lady Olivier, an Irish widow (?) came: very moved by the production, very pleased with it. So I said to her 'Just tell me, Larry and the cat'.
*as Joan Plowright* 'He never used a cat'
So there we are - we have three people who were all there, all know what was going on and all completely undecided.
I think probably what he did was he came on with a real cat, palmed it, then threw a fake cat, which meant that he delivered it to ____ in the wings.
But I have real cat 'Poppy' and if you're watching Poppy, all my love and I look forward to seeing you next time.

P: What about movies, because you've had this wonderful career In moves - two extraordinary Iconic parts, Lord of the Rings and X-men, the new film coming out very shortly..

I: "X-men 2", a witty title…

P: A witty title, yes. Long time thinking about that.

Paul Merton:: Y-Men, I suppose.

I: The Y-front men. Actually, the x-men do wear y-fronts.

P: (to Merton and McKellen) Are you quite finished this private conversation?!
Tell me about Lord of the Rings, when you're playing the wizard Gandalf. When you were given that part to play did you have any Idea of the kind of weight of responsibility that was around your shoulders.

I: No, none at all. I hadn't read the book, books nor with X-men had I read the comics and they've both been going for around 50 years now. And you're right, they are Iconic figures for their fans.
I learnt very early on, because I've got a website and people communicated with me and said 'now look, get Gandalf right or there'll be trouble'.
And although when you're doing a film actors often miss the audience, I had a great sense there was an audience waiting for the movies. So the responsibility was very strong and I was just glad and optimistic there would be an audience but whether it would be an audience that would approve was the question mark.

P: They did.

I: Which they did, resoundingly.

P: But what about the appearance, how did you work that one out?

I: Well that was everything really wasn't It, to look like Gandalf. Easy enough because Tolkien who wrote the novels, makes it very clear what Gandalf looks like, and Alan Lee and John Howe, the two great Illustrators - and anyone who's read the book thinks of Gandalf from those illustrations - they were on hand once I was having my make-up devised and it took about 3 days. There were various wigs, various moustaches, various eyebrows, various noses, various beards and I kept looking in the mirror and I could see various hirsute gentlemen, quite inappropriate, like Ben Gunn, Rasputin, Osama Bin Laden…
And then, I don't know, It all came together one day and the people who were doing all this stepped back and I looked and I did a little twinkle with my eye and I said 'Gandalf?', and you know, a bit like you (gesturing to Jerome Flynn), feeling 'oh my god, I've been taken over'. I stood up, and because I looked like him, I could walk like him and that was It, It was over, it was easy.
That work had all been done by a committee actually.

P: Yes, It's a strange job, this make believe world.

I: There's a little bit In Stanislavski, the guy who devised 'the method' that may many serious actors follow to get Into their part, and he says, refreshingly, 'If all else fails, and If you can't find the part In your own past or imagine It, look In the mirror and start putting on some make-up, and try to look like the character'.
And in 'Rap' (?), where I started out with only of couple of weeks to get a performance out of nowhere, many's the time I was without a character at the dress rehearsal sticking on moustaches, saying 'will that do', 'will this one do'.. so there are various little ways into a character.

P: Now what about, you worked on this film for how long?

I: One year

P: One year.

I: Though I still have, Dance of Death has to got to come off mid-June because I've got to go back and do - they've written some new scenes in for Gandy, yes.

P: Very close little community, you bonded together, there was a tattoo, a fellowship tattoo.

I: Yes, yes, there was

P: I'm simply wondering if: a) you were tattoo-ed, b) if you'd show us you tattoo and c) where is it?

I: Well, when I show it to you, if I show it to you, you'll know where it is, won't you?

P: Don't be coy!

I: I can't believe this! When did you last have a distinguished guest stripping off? Obviously not often enough.

P: No often enough, no.

I: Do you want me to show you?

P: I do please, yes - explain the tattoo.

I: The tattoo is about my person and we all went down to a seedy tattoo parlor - but are when are tattoo parlors not seedy - in Wellington, the capital city of New Zealand, and held each other's hands while we had it put in various places. Many of the hobbits had theirs put down here (gestures to ankle), Elijah Wood had his down here (goes to undo trousers) Oh no… (stops but indicates just below the right hip bone).
But mine is in a traditional place and it says nine in elvish because there are nine members of the fellowship.

P: Is that a proper tattoo?

I: Yeah, it won't come off. The engaging thing is that from the angle at which I have to look at it, if you just extend that first letter, then give it a little twirl, it spells Gucci.

P: When's it coming off? Dance of Death.

I: The tattoo's not coming off.

P: Yes, Dance of Death.

I: Dance of Death goes through to the second week in June and then I do a bit more Gandy. Gandalf, sorry. I call him Gandy but everyone else calls him Gandalf.

P: Edgar, who you play in Dance of Death, is not an evil man. He's a tyrant.

I: Depends how you look at it, his wife thinks he's a total monster and traditionally he's been one of the great stage monsters like Shylock, Iago, or Richard III.

P: Who you've played.

I: Well, I've played a few of those.

P: Hitler?

I: I have played Hitler, yes, on television. The way into those parts is to look to find the humanity you can relate to. Of course these people, as horrible as they are, aren't horrible all the time and they don't necessarily think of themselves as being horrible and you have to stick up for the character you're playing. Not that you go around playing them as sweet-hearted pussycats but I think if you asked Edgar was he horrible he'd say 'I'm perfectly reasonable, it's my wife that's horrible', and she thinks the same of him.

P: And would Hitler have thought he was a reasonable man?

I: Well, I daresay, yes. I daresay Saddam Hussein where ever he is thinks 'what's everyone getting so excited about'.
But certainly if you were playing those dreadful people, you can't start by thinking I'm going to play the embodiment of all evil, how can you do that? No, you look for the humanity.

P: That's interesting. Now what about future performances. I hear a whisper you might be playing pantomime this year, in London.

I: Oooh, wouldn't that be nice. I haven't…I want to play a dame. (to Jerome Flynn) Don't you want to play a dame?

JF: I want to see you playing a dame.

I: Oh, thank you. Last year, I thought I'm actually going to do it at last because the National Theatre was going to have a pantomime and they got around to doing it because every single man in the National Theatre Company wanted to play a dame, so there was no one left to play the other parts.
Norwich said I could go and play at theirs. I thought 'Norwich, it's out of the way, no one will know I'm doing it, and my friends won't come to see it.' [go] try it out.
I just had a couple of conversations on the phone and the first one was:
'Could I look at the script?'
"We don't have a script. You arrive with your material"
'Oh. Fine. Who's directing?'
"Oh, we don't have a director"
'How long will we be rehearsing?'
"A good 10 days"
Well, you know, I'm used to four weeks. So I thought about this for a time and then called up and said 'now about the schedule' because I know you have to do panto twice a day minimum. He said "Now let me just have a look at the diary… towards the end of January you do get a couple of mornings off".
Which is why I didn't play pantomime in Norwich.

P: But why is it an ambition of yours, what is it about pantomime?

I: Because of this almost obsession with funny men, of course the point about a dame is that it is a funny man, it's not a female impersonation. It's not Lily Savage, it's not Danny LaRue, it's Norman Wisdom over the garden wall.

P: Norman Evans

I: Norman Evans, yes, not Norman Wisdom and do you know, his daughter came to see the play the other day and had heard me saying that I was a fan of her fathers and she wrote me a sweet letter. She's called Norma Evans.

P: It's an important part of our lives, the laughter is terribly important.

I: And why? Why doesn't the Palladium have variety? Why has variety gone? I think people expect more.
(to Jerome Flynn) You're doing two hours of Tommy Cooper. I bet Tommy Cooper never did an hour on stage. When I saw him he did about 40 minutes. And you know, when Frank Sinatra was top of the Palladium, he probably only sang about 6 songs. To see a great singer now, you'd want a whole evening of him - it's changed a bit.
But, there's nothing like variety. And when you come across a bit in the show you're not enjoying, you nipped out and had a drink in the bar. There was coming and going, it was all on a human level.

P: But people have stopped going to the theatre like that, you see.

I: Talking about theatre. I did Dance of Death on Broadway when we opened a week after September 11th when suddenly Manhattan was cut off from the rest of the world and audiences for new plays weren't too bad but for anything that had been on for a long time, plummeted.
Well, the same thing is happening now with the war. Broadway is having a dreadful time, even getting to see any show on Broadway, and it's, the same is true in the West End.
I just want to encourage people, if I can, that now is a great time to go to the West End because the tourists are not coming, and all those seats that they would normally take up - tourists not only from abroad but from this country - are keeping away from them. Locals, this is the time to go, you'll get into any theatre and you can park, you'll probably get cheap prices, ask for discounts.

(cue much applause)

P: Well thank you very much for talking to us, Sir Ian McKellen.



There's a really good in-depth interview with Billy Boyd here - they're going to be putting a new part of the interview up each day.
apparently, the script that he and dom are working on is finished...

IGNFF: Well I know a lot of your compatriots have made the move out to L.A., haven't they?

BOYD: Yeah, Dom stays over there now, which is great for me, and for him as well. But it's great that whenever I go out, Dom's there and I can go and chill out with him and catch up and, of course, Elijah's always been there. So yeah, I've got a lot of friends – Orlando spends a lot of time there. When I go over, we all catch up. Then I've got other friends, not from the Ring. In fact, one of them just came home, a guy, Mark, who's a very good friend. For a while there, like last summer, we had a great summer ... I went on holiday with Orlando and Dom – we went to Cocoa Beach, and we surfed there.

IGNFF: Did it compare to the surfing in New Zealand?

BOYD: Yeah, that was great.

IGNFF: But you can't beat a beach house in Florida.

BOYD: Yeah, that'd be perfect. In fact, me and Dom have written a script that is based in the Keys.

IGNFF: Is this the diving script?

BOYD: Yeah, basically just so that we can go and hang out some summer and make a movie, you know?

IGNFF: That'd be a good time to buy the house in Florida.

BOYD: That'd be great, wouldn't it! Maybe we could get the company to buy one for us, whoever makes it. Rather than put us up in a hotel – get us a house!

IGNFF: It could technically be the offices...

BOYD: Exactly! We could actually save someone money here... We've finished the script, actually. I was lucky enough... I was making a film last year down in Mexico and Dom would come down quite a lot and visit me, along with Elijah and stuff. We actually managed to really finish the script on the drive up and down from L.A. We just got a little Dictaphone and we'd just talk it through and talk it through. So we finished it, and we're just going to let some people see it now, and hopefully we'll get it made.


New Troy info - describing Troy itself, aswell as the characters. Nice article, plus a rather nice picture of Orlando...