Film Force Interview
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Interview with Sir Ian McKellen "...for me ... there's never been much of a division between people who write about the plays as academic texts and study them for examinations, and actors like me who analyze them for performance." July 10, 2000 - IGN FilmForce interviewer Kenneth Plume recently talked to Sir Ian McKellen. In his 40-year career as an actor, McKellen has appeared in more than forty films and scores of theatrical productions. His film credits include Six Degrees of Separation, Richard III, Gods and Monsters, and Apt Pupil, as well as this weekend's X-Men and the highly anticipated Lord of the Rings trilogy. In his four-part conversation with Ken, McKellen discusses his start as an actor, his views on acting, entertainment and filmmaking today, and his work on Richard III, Gods and Monsters, Apt Pupil, X-Men and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. PLUME: Tell me about your formative years... What drew you to acting? MCKELLEN: Before I ever acted as an amateur – which I did a great deal at school and at university – I used to go to the theater with my parents in the north of England, where I was born and brought up... Theater of all sorts. A weekly repertory theater played every week at the Bolton Hippodrome, visiting opera and ballet companies at the Theatre Royal, vaudeville theater at the Grand. For Shakespeare and the classics, sometimes my parents took us to the big city of Manchester close by to see famous actors in all sorts of plays. I was also taken by the school each year for a week's camping in Stratford-on-Avon to see the Shakespeare season there. That's how I first enjoyed acting – mainly through the theater, as we didn't go to the cinema much. It was because I enjoyed watching other people act that I thought, "I'd like to have a go at that myself." There was no early intention of being a professional. I went to study English at Cambridge, and there did a great deal of acting with friends who were determined to become professionals: Trevor Nunn – who now runs the National Theater, Sir Derek Jacobi, Sir David Frost, Peter Cook, and others. I caught the bug there... It was then that I realized, "Well, if they're going to be able to do it in the professional theatre, then perhaps I can myself." When I left Cambridge, I applied to regional repertory theaters in the UK and got accepted by one of them... And here I am, still at it. PLUME: This would be around the late '50's, early '60's, right? MCKELLEN: I started in 1961. PLUME: What was it about acting that enamored you of the process? MCKELLEN: When I started to do it, I discovered I could do it. I think it's as simple as that. I didn't have any other specialties that I was good at. Growing up and finding an enjoyable activity which the grown-ups admired – or don't object to – for a nice well-behaved boy was fulfilling. It gave me an identity that otherwise I didn't particularly feel I had. PLUME: Did your heart stray in any other directions? MCKELLEN: Before acting, I wanted to become a journalist. I also toyed with the idea of being a chef – but that's only when people asked me what I wanted to be. In fact, I always used to say I wanted to be an actor, but I didn't ever believe that I was good enough to be come one. It was only at Cambridge, when I was surrounded by others who wanted to become professionals – and when I got a few good reviews in the national press of my acting – that I thought, "Oh well, maybe it's okay." But what did I really enjoy about it? It probably has something to do with my sense of being gay... It's very difficult to talk about this or analyze it. If you were growing up gay in the 1950's in the north of England, you had a secret which was difficult to share... PLUME: If not impossible... MCKELLEN: Well, it used to feel like it was impossible. Yet, when you were on stage, you could be absolutely open about your emotions and indulge them and express yourself in a way that – in real life – I wasn't doing. I think that was part of the appeal. Certainly I felt, when I decided to become a professional, that, "Oh good... I'm going to be able to meet some real-life queers." Because I'd heard that the theater was full of them... and so it has proved. PLUME: How would you describe the atmosphere at Cambridge? Was it conducive to the fostering of an artistic bent? MCKELLEN: There's still no drama faculty at Cambridge – nor at Oxford – but a great deal of acting went on at the time. Undergraduate groups of actors run by the undergraduates and advised by theater-mad dons – one of them, John Barton, left Cambridge while I was there to become a senior director at the Royal Shakespeare Company. So we had connections with the professional theater, and during each vacation we were recording the whole of the Shakespeare's works, playing supporting parts to professional actors who were brought down for a weekend in Cambridge to record a play at a time. Some of our productions used to play in London on professional stages. The line between being an amateur actor and a professional was nicely blurred. I was told by my tutor that if I went on acting, my academic studies were going to suffer – and they did – but we were all young gentleman and we were thought to be responsible enough to do whatever we wanted to do, and what I wanted to do was indulge myself in the theater, and I was allowed to get on with it pretty well. PLUME: How difficult was the transition out of Cambridge and into the "professional world"? MCKELLEN: Well, it seemed easy, because I was very keen and very enthusiastic and in love with the theater and the idea of theater – and professional theater people seemed to be the most fascinating in the world, and there's no where else I wanted to be. It didn't feel, by that time, like strange territory. It was just constantly fascinating. I just looked around for the people who were the best at it and tried to contact them and work with them. None of this was fueled by a desire to be a star, or famous, or rich, or be in movies or even in television... It was theater that I was interested in. Appearing in front of a live audience, and the problems, technicalities, and joys of that. It was also rooted in – and this is why Cambridge was crucial to me – a respect for the word and the text of a play... Which, of course, overlaps into your studies. You study Shakespeare, you study plays, and so – for me – there's never been much of a division between people who write about the plays as academic texts and study them for examinations, and actors like me who analyze them for performance. We seem to be in the same business, really. PLUME: So you're saying that the study and need for understanding is the same, but the actor decides to take it a step further and get up on the stage and perform it... MCKELLEN: Yes, that's right. PLUME: What were the opportunities afforded or the challenges inherent for a young actor starting out in the professional world at that time? MCKELLEN: That sounds suspiciously like "What advice would you give a young actor..." I think the point to be understood is that we're all different. I've never been a fan of theories of acting. I didn't go to drama school, so I was never put through a training that was limited by someone saying, "This is the way you should act." We all act differently. Acting is a very personal process. It has to do with expressing your own personality, and discovering the character you're playing through your own experience – so we're all different. We all do it in different ways. My experience is my experience, and it isn't necessarily relevant to anybody else. I certainly don't disparage someone whose attitude towards their work is utterly different from mine – that's up to them. I think the only judgement I would make is "Are they doing it well?" and "Are they doing it seriously?" PLUME: How subjective is the critique "Are they doing it well?" MCKELLEN: Well, then you have to say, "This is the script as written. This is the style in which it's written. Is this actor adopting the right style and playing his/her part appropriately within the story that's being told. That's how I would make a judgement. It wouldn't be of any interest to me, necessarily, to know how he/she had achieved it, or what their experience was before the moment I actually saw them on stage. PLUME: If you were to sum up your early experiences on the stage as a professional, how would you do so? MCKELLEN: I was a very hard worker, and I was determined to become better at the job in the way that I've just been describing – in a variety of parts and a variety of sorts of plays. I don't make much distinction between being a stand-up comic and acting Shakespeare – in fact, unless you're a good comedian, you're never going to be able to play Hamlet properly. I didn't go after the glamorous side of acting. I deliberately kept away from London theater for three years, I didn't accept offers to work on television, I made no attempt to get into films... I was just busy trying to be a half-good theater actor, and that's still my attitude today – although I'm now fortunate to do more than just theater. It's always trying to get better at the job, and I always judge my success in a play or a movie – not just by "Did I do it well", but "What did I learn from that?" Rather than the part, I still judge whether to accept a job by who's directing it, have we got enough time to prepare it, who else is in it, how good is the script, and all those sort of things, because you're always part of the collective process – and if the other people aren't any good, than you're unlikely to be good yourself. PLUME: I've heard from a lot of people who do theater early in their careers that there seems to be a disdain for movie and TV work... MCKELLEN: Yes, I think that's true. John Gielgud felt the need later in his life to apologize for the fact that he'd been rather snooty about the cinema early on... A rather new invention when he was a young man. The same is true with me and television. However, if – like me – the starting point for any job is the script, there are not many Shakespeare's or Ibsen's or Chekov's writing for television or the film industry at the moment... Yet there are a lot of dramatists trying to match up to those masters. I think it is possible – if you're caught up in the world of theater – to underestimate the seriousness of the film industry as a whole. These days, I'm increasingly aware of the many dedicated filmmakers worldwide. I don't any longer make any quality judgement between theater and cinema. They are different experiences for the audience, and they also are for the actors – although they have a lot in common. It's sometimes a bit bewildering to me how excited film enthusiasts get about the latest action movie or bit of schlock, and judge it mainly by how much it takes over the first weekend. How much money is it going to make is a major part of the film industry, but in the theater, that is almost the last thing to be concerned with. It really is, because you can have full houses for a year at the National Theater in Great Britain and no one makes any money at all. PLUME: Do you think modern audiences see theater as almost a chore, to have to go in and sit down and pay attention and think? MCKELLEN: It's a different experience, isn't it? Popcorn is a vital part of cinema-going in your country, but woe betide anyone who sits next to me with popcorn whilst we're watching the latest stage production of "Macbeth." There's very popular theater and there's very popular cinema, and I like them both. It just so happens that, most of my life, I've been involved in what disparagers would call the "snootier" end of the market. On the whole, if I'm making a film, I would like it to be a film that was not just going to excite and entertain, but intellectually stimulate its audience and change their perception of what the world is about in a meaningful way. The famous English comic, Ken Dodd, goes on for three or four hours if necessary – and what's necessary for him is that he does not want anybody to leave the theater unless he feels that their minds have shifted... Even by a millimeter. He says, "If I've done that... If they're going to remember this experience as having changed them... Then I'm happy." And that's what storytelling is about. I'm not interested in stories which confirm or stories that bolster people's prejudices and existing attitudes – I'm interested in the radical and the possibility that, having seen a film or watched a television show or been to the theater, you could be enlightened in some way. It doesn't mean to say that you haven't had a really good time... In fact, I think that is having the best possible time. PLUME: But you prefer an audience leave the theater thinking... MCKELLEN: Well, it's thinking and feeling, of course. You can change your perceptions by your emotions. I would be unhappy to come out of a theater as an audience if I hadn't felt something. PLUME: As opposed to walking out the same you walked in, or as a blank slate being completely unaffected... MCKELLEN: Yeah... Or walking out saying, "I saw that before – about 20 years ago. It was another group of actors, but I've seen it before." It's a cliche, but I think it's basically true that good art is radical. It challenges. It's potentially dangerous, and that's why the first thing dictators do is close the airport – so people can't get out or in, they close down the broadcasting stations – so people are ignorant of what's going on, and then they close the theaters – because that's where strangers communicate through the shared experience of emotions and ideas. The theater is a very, very potent institution – and the cinema, too. PLUME: Do you think that the radical material is less likely to be funded today? MCKELLEN: Mainstream cinema is always after the big audience, isn't it? PLUME: Do you think traditional theater has tried to follow the big-money lead of film when it comes to what projects get staged? MCKELLEN: Well, it's certainly true on Broadway and on the West End of London – that the block-busting, moneymaking show is squeezing out other sorts of theater. That's not to say that those shows can't, in themselves, be very good of their kind. It also doesn't take into account that Off-Broadway has lots of theater and there are many small theaters beyond the West End that the sort of plays I'm talking about – whether they're classics or new plays – thrive. I'm not pessimistic about the death of public entertainment. In the meantime, of course, we've got the video and the DVD – television seems to be over and done with... It never really started, frankly. I do think it's a pity, that a film made for a large screen and a relatively large group of strangers, should be watched alone in a darkened room with a fast-forward button to hand and the telephone about to ring. The amount of concentration needed isn't there. I was alarmed when a friend told me, "I've just seen your film of 'Richard III'..." They were in America, and I said, "You can't. It's not out yet." She said, "No, I saw it on the plane coming over." She was judging Richard III on a screen 3 inches by 4! PLUME: With cheap headphones... MCKELLEN: Yes! Most films – even Titanic – will be seen by most people on a small screen. It's a bewilderment and a puzzle to me and something that I talked to serious filmmakers about, and they don't seem to be as alarmed by it as I am. PLUME: Are they more concerned with the material being seen by any means necessary? MCKELLEN: I expect so. However, DVD is a little bit different... The quality is improved and the screen's likely to be larger. It is a fact that the film industry now is – in the end – making movies not for public theatrical release, but for the home screen. PLUME: You've worked with a lot of filmmakers in recent years, like Bryan Singer, and have been one yourself... How does that affect the mindset of those producing the films? MCKELLEN: I think that on the whole – I wouldn't say this is true of Bryan – the filmmakers are not thinking beyond the first weekend. They are always thinking about the big screen, but it's me who's saying, "Don't you realize that most people aren't going to see it that weekend? Most people in the end – including the block-busting Titanic's – will be seeing them on their own." The difference between watching a comedy on your own and in a theater is obvious – you don't laugh at home. It's very unusual to laugh out loud when alone – it's not natural. But you are released from your inhibitions, oddly enough, when you're in the cinema or a theater full of people who are laughing. You have a much better time as a group. PLUME: Do you think as a culture – just by the nature of our modern entertainment – that we're shifting towards being solitary people? Merely for convenience sake? MCKELLEN: It may well be. The potency of the laptop is difficult to judge yet... It's all too new. I'm not as pessimistic about it as all that... PLUME: Or do you think that it's in our nature to seek out that group experience? MCKELLEN: I don't know about the cinema – cinema's a very new invention – but theater is a very old way of storytelling, and it goes back thousands of years, and it will never disappear. It may change, but public storytelling in a public place – where you can see and hear a three-dimensional human being – may be seen now as an old-fashioned, labor-intensive, too-expensive way of going about it, but it's a human level. An awful lot of the way we communicate at the moment is not human... I have no idea what your face is doing at the moment, I have no idea whether you've got somebody else in the room who you're more interested in than listening to me – I can't judge it, and vice-versa. In a theater or a marketplace or a in a public debate, you know what's going on and you can see what's happening and you're a part of it and you're reminded that's what being a human being is – it is being in the presence of other human beings and enjoying that... Touching them and confronting them and everything else that human beings do to each other. I would feel very sorry for someone who didn't know about that experience, or have access to it. PLUME: At what point did you consider yourself to be on the same level as your peers? At what point did you no longer feel like an amateur, but instead felt on the level of having some accomplishments behind you? MCKELLEN: Well, after I'd been acting for about 10 years and I did Shakespeare's "Richard II," and Arnold Turner and I did Marlowe's play "Edward II" – this began at the Edinborough theater and then toured the United Kingdom and played for two sell-out seasons in London – and I was playing both leading parts. I didn't say to myself, "Oh, this proves that I'm better than other people..." but after I'd done that job, I discovered that employers and audiences seemed to know who I was and seemed to want me to play other parts. So it was after about 10 years. PLUME: Was it personally gratifying to have that recognition? MCKELLEN: Yes, and a bit unexpected. I was genuinely unambitious as a young actor, in terms of wanting to be famous or a star – but once you discover the joy and the challenge of playing the leading part, you want to do it again. That hasn't stopped me on many occasions on stage and in cinema playing supporting parts – they too can have satisfaction. Certainly in film, you don't have to play the leading part to feel important, because while the camera is turning you are the leading actor. If it's a close-up of you, the star of the movie will be behind the camera feeding you your lines and so – whilst you're working – you feel very important. Less so in the theater, but if you're doing a Chekov play, there is no leading part. Because your part's smaller than somebody else's, you don't feel less involved. There is a special satisfaction in playing what we call a "play-carrying" part. PLUME: Do you think it's almost more challenging to go back and play the supporting roles? MCKELLEN: Yes, because if the playwright hasn't done his work properly, the part – because it's smaller – will make special demands on the actor's need to get it right within the one or two scenes in which you appear. If you play Hamlet, you can have an off-period for three quarters of an hour and still grab them back in the fifth act. It's true that playing smaller parts can be more difficult. PLUME: During the mid-to-late '60's, you started transitioning into TV and film roles... What brought about that shift? MCKELLEN: Because I got offered work, I think, and I felt fairly confident about the way my theater career was going... PLUME: So it was important to you to make sure your theater career was solidified before moving into these other venues? MCKELLEN: Yes, but I hadn't really thought about TV and film, and when they began to turn up, I think I probably said to myself, "Oh, it would be good to become a successful film actor, because that would somehow augment my theater career." I didn't think of it as striking out in a new direction, particularly. Of late – much later than the period you're talking about – I've played some leading parts in films with some good directors and learned how to do it. I've had a long period of learning how to do film, over the last 10-12 years. Now, I'm absolutely fascinated by it and want to do more. PLUME: You mentioned learning how to do film... What were the challenges for you? MCKELLEN: I was frightened of the camera... Most people are. You just think of yourself having your photograph taken – it's not a pleasant experience. You're worried about what you look like. You suddenly become unnatural... You want to comb your hair, you want to take your glasses off, you want to say, "Please take another one, I wasn't ready." That's what it feels like when you're not secure in front of a film camera, but a hundred times worse, of course, because you're doing it for a living... You're going to be judged. And the film is moving through the camera the whole time. Before I did the film of "Richard III," I deliberately took time off from theater – I didn't do any theater – I only did film... Anything on screen... Anything. I played some very small parts, and visited other people's movies – as it were – and learned the job. By the time I came to Richard III, I'd gotten used to film. I was much more relaxed about it. I knew a few of the tricks of filming – the techniques – and I learned not to be frightened of the camera... Nor, indeed, of the scores of people standing behind it, looking at me. I used to think that they were all – the director, the cinematographer, and everybody else – standing behind the camera and judging me and saying that I was no good. Then one day, relatively recently – I don't know when it was – I suddenly thought, "No, no, no... They're not there judging me – they're helping me. The director wants me to be good, the cameraman is making sure I'm properly lit, the costume people are making sure that the costume looks right... Everybody's there to make sure this shot is good, and I'm the lucky one who's in the shot and I'm working on their behalf." Suddenly, instead of just being the focus of everyone's criticism, I became the focus of their collective work. PLUME: In that regard, do you think the level of feedback is greater in the filming process than it is on stage? MCKELLEN: No, because the people I've just been talking about are the only audience, and they're not objective – they're part of the process. In the theater, you have people who don't know how it's done and are not particularly interested in how it's done – they just want to receive it. It's those people who you don't have with you when you're filming, but the audience you do have are colleagues and peers and great experts in their own fields – all there willing you to be good. Once I'd accepted that, then filming became a much more relaxing process. Then I did Richard III, and I was very pleased with that work. I thought, "Oh, I see... I can act in films." I then decided to try and do more of it. PLUME: So you basically wanted to have a comfort level with the medium before you tackled Richard III... MCKELLEN: Yes. I'd played leading parts in movies before Richard III... It's just that you never saw the films, or they weren't very good, or they didn't succeed – partly, probably, because I wasn't ready to be playing leading parts. The most important attribute any actor can have in whatever medium they're working in is self-confidence. A willingness to risk and to dare and to explore and to do something that they didn't know they could do. Not to be safe, not to repeat, not to always be the same, not to be typecast – I'm talking personally, but I'm sure that's true about the self-confidence you need. Some people are born with self-confidence – some one like Peter O'Toole or Kenneth Brannagh – you know they were just born with it. They don't have to think about it, they're just out there doing it. Their ego is nicely developed and God-given, but people like me are sloggers. I'm not a born actor – I've learned how to do it. It's been a trade. I've had to learn the craft, and after all these years of being a carpenter in the theater, suddenly I've turned myself into an electrician – as a film actor... You see what I mean? It's another related craft that I've had to learn. PLUME: In furthering your analogy, at what point did you feel you turned from a craftsman into an artist? MCKELLEN: I don't call myself an artist. Actors are the last people to join the process – it begins with the script and the people who nurture the script, then gradually they take on board supporters, directors, designers, producers – and rather late in the day, they say, "Ooop! We've got to get some actors." You can see this is true, because some actors who spend their lives often being very good and very successful, say, "I can't be an actor... I've got to be a producer or a director – I've got to be a mover." And so Kevin Costner starts directing, and all the big Hollywood stars are all their own producers – Tom Cruise... He's in charge. The actor is never in charge if you're just the actor. So, to call myself an artist... No... I've never had an original thought in my mind. I just do what's there. PLUME: Don't you have to bring your own personal interpretation which, to some extent, is a form of artistry? MCKELLEN: Compare it with being a teacher... PLUME: Well, there are good teachers and bad teachers... MCKELLEN: You could take tickets on the subway and be an artist in the way you're describing, because you do it as yourself with your personality. Yes, I use my own personality, but an artist... Michaelangelo was an artist... Anton Chekov was an artist... I'm just an actor. PLUME: But there are good actors and there are bad actors... MCKELLEN: Oh yes, certainly. PLUME: So there must be some measure of investment that's made or talent that's there that differentiates the good actors from the bad... MCKELLEN: Yes, there is, but you're not likely to be good unless the script is good. You look at who wins the Oscars, and it's usually people who have the best parts. Five actors get nominated each year, and it's because they were lucky enough to get one of the five best parts going that year... But they didn't write them. PLUME: Although you can have a part that is excellently written but poorly performed... MCKELLEN: That is true, but what is good about your performance is going to be based on what is good about the script. That is my point. Give a good actor a bad part, and they're usually at sea. We're talking about whether actors are artists and – on the whole – I think we aren't. We may be in the arts, but we are not the artists. We are the actors. PLUME: What kind of fulfillment do you get, personally, from acting? MCKELLEN: Always the group that I'm working with. I move from job to job, from family to family, from group of friends to group of friends – sometimes they're old friends, but often they're new ones. For the time of working, the experience is so intense – it's like you're all climbing Everest together, or going on a trek or a journey. You're all interdependent... You've all got your different jobs – some more crucial than others, maybe – but you're all needed. It's a wonderful, wonderful thing for a human being, because that's living life as it's meant to be. You're in your own village. Some people may enjoy being the leader of the village... That's not really my style. I just like being there, and in it. That's the satisfaction that I get. On top of that, of course, I want the audience to enjoy the work that we create, because that's why we're doing it. We're always thinking about, "Will people like it? Will people understand it? Will people be moved by it?" To get high-fallutin', "Are their lives be altered by it?" That's the focus of your attention. And on top of that, personally, I say to myself, "Can I do this? Is this something I can do?" I'm always taking parts that I don't think I can play, and that – for me – is the trick. Don't play a part that you know you can do... It's likely to be boring and you're likely to repeat yourself and you may get into bad habits... but if it's something you don't know you can do, you're going to be asking questions about it, you're going to be worrying about it, puzzling about it, thinking about it, working hard at it, asking advice. The achievement – if you've managed to pull it off to your own satisfaction, or the director's, or the audiences', or the critics'... Well, that's why it's the best job in the world for me PLUME: It sounds similar to mountain climbing, to some extent – you hope you never run across Everest, because after you climb Everest, what do you do after that? MCKELLEN: Well, you get to the top of one mountain, and often, "Oh bugger me, there's another one!" You haven't got to the top. You never finish... You only finish when your boots wear out and you think, "Oh god, I'm going back to first base... No, in fact I'm not, I'm going home." I'm not going home just yet. PLUME: If you were to look around and take stock right now, would you say that you were happy with where you're going? MCKELLEN: Yeah, I'm about halfway up, I would think. PLUME: And no idea if there's another mountain beyond that... MCKELLEN: Who knows! It's thrilling. I've gotten myself into a situation – mainly by luck, but also by a lot of hard work – where I can choose the company I keep and the work that I do. The judgement I usually make is "Is this a story worth telling?" and if I'm not entirely sure I can do it, and I ask the director, "Can I do it?" – and, of course, he's going to say "Yes," or else I wouldn't have been cast – well, then, on we go. You ask anyone who's running any sort of race or playing any sort of match or doing any sort of athletic enterprise – they're not certain they can do it. That's why they're doing it... To prove that they can. But they don't know, do they, until they hit the tape or get to the top. PLUME: Do you have any aspirations beyond acting? MCKELLEN: No... PLUME: Or is this what your happiest doing? MCKELLEN: Within my own life outside acting, yes. I don't want to become a politician or – even within the business – I don't want to be a director. I've tried that , and I'm no good at it. There are too many opportunities, fortunately, for me. If I wasn't allowed to make films for some reason, there's the theater – and vice-versa. If I lost a leg and couldn't walk, I could always do radio. Fortunately, there's a lot of areas in which people can act. I think I might like to get more involved with young actors who are learning how to do it – not because I think I know how they should do it, but I'd like to see how they do it. I do like the company of young people, and I don't want to get old in the sense of, "I know how it's done. Things aren't as good as they used to be..." PLUME: You don't want to be isolationist... MCKELLEN: No, not at all. Of course, that's another wonderful thing about acting – when you're on the journey, there are likely to be people who are older than you and younger than you and you encounter different experiences and different nationalities. It's a very, very, very privileged way of life, because it's so fulfilling. PLUME: Do you see a time when you'll actively withdraw from the business, say along the lines of Alec Guinness? MCKELLEN: He's much older than I am... I don't know. Energies can run out in your 80's, obviously – though John Gielgud changed his agent the year before he died. Last year, for instance, after I did a very hard spell of theater – I did 3 plays, one after the other in a regional company in the UK – and I said to myself, "For the rest of the century – for the rest of 1999 – I'm not going to work unless a wonderful film part comes up, and if it doesn't, I'm not going to worry." That meant that I didn't work for 7 months – until I did X-Men. It was almost shocking, what a good time I had. PLUME: Was it reinvigorating? MCKELLEN: Yes. I did quite a lot of traveling, I was with friends, and did enjoy – I must say – not having to get up early to go to work and not having to go out in the evening to work, as you have to do in theater. I was able to have a drink when I wanted, to eat when I wanted, and if I fancied to suddenly to go off for a weekend somewhere or other, I did. I got a hint of what I've missed in my life, because I have worked pretty well non-stop. PLUME: So you found the joy of "The Sabbatical"... MCKELLEN: Yeah. PLUME: Do you find it nice to be at a point in your career where you can go off and do that, and know that your career will still be waiting for you when you come back? MCKELLEN: Yes... Absolutely. PLUME: It's not something that's afforded to many actors... MCKELLEN: No, it isn't. PLUME: I want to touch on a couple of your films now, so – if you could – give me your recollections and experiences of working on the them... We'll start with Richard III... MCKELLEN: Well, I've written a book about it, you know... It's the screenplay, and it's got an extensive introduction and notes explaining why we did what we did with every cut and every scene. It's available through my website. Richard III was immensely satisfying, because it was my own idea. We'd played it for two years in the theater – on and off, and across the world – and I knew it was a very popular version of the play with audiences. I thought that the production would transfer very well to film, so I wrote the screenplay. Then I had to get it made. When the first day of shooting came and after all the desperate work – over 3 years, during which time I'd just been doing these other films I was talking about – I saw Annette Bening in costume, two mighty trains that used to belong to Adolf Hitler puffing steam, 50 horses and wranglers, a few dogs... and there I was in my uniform surrounded by a hundred extras and technicians and the sun was shining, and it was all because I said to myself one day, "Wouldn't it be wonderful to make a film." As you can imagine, that felt good. PLUME: Next... Gods and Monsters... MCKELLEN: I don't think any work has been closer to myself than that film was, at the point in which I made it. It was not just a leading part in a Hollywood movie, but it was a group of independent filmmakers who I found very congenial, in that their aspirations for their work are very much what mine are. The fact that the leading part was a gay man, and an Englishman once more – and yet it was about Hollywood. It was about what it's like to be involved in my industry – and the man had been an actor most of his life before he became a director, and had an actor's temperament and an actor's self-regard and awareness. Everything just came together beautifully. Although it was a very short shoot – four weeks – there was nothing wrong with anything.... The script, the director, the crew, the cast. Then, when people said they liked it, and I got something like 15 best-acting awards for it. That's when I knew it was good and had been done exactly the way that I've been describing and it worked – the satisfaction was total, really. I don't despair, but it's unlikely that will ever happen again. PLUME: As a tangent, you are one of the few openly gay leading actors in Hollywood today, in an atmosphere that talks liberally a lot of the time, but still don't practice what they preach to some extent. Have you found that in any way difficult, or have you found that people really not even consider it when casting? MCKELLEN: Well if they do, they don't tell me about it, of course. Since I came out, the self-confidence that I was talking about has been complete. I'm my own person, now. For so many years – every gay person knows this – they've been lying... to somebody. They've been dishonest. They've often become dependent on that and figured it as a way of life, and they can't imagine any other way. They'd be lost without it. Why so many people stay in the closet is that they think this is how it was meant to be. I know men who come out discover that, "No, that's the old you, and the new you is someone who other people – on the whole – prefer, sometimes admire, because people like honesty on the whole." My film career took off. Of the 20-odd parts I've played since coming out, only 3 have been gay... I've not been typecast. There may have been parts that I wouldn't have been considered for, but if we're talking about romantic leads – I've smooched with Greta Scacchi on-screen. I've played John Profumo, the English politician, who nobody remembers except he was a raging heterosexual who made love to Joanne Whalley-Kilmer under silk sheets. I played a straight rapist in a Western. PLUME: And audiences don't seem to care one way or the other... MCKELLEN: No, of course they don't. PLUME: People in control of studios and networks make assumptions that there will be some massive wave of protest, but what it should really come down to – straight or gay – is talent... MCKELLEN: That's right... and the job is called "acting." You go to look at that. When you see me, you're not seeing me – you're seeing me acting as somebody. Audiences understand this... Producers seem to have a problem with it. Really, it's not the producers, it's the people who are trying to make the money – I'm talking now about television advertisers – because they are the people who make money out of anything done on television, and a lot of what's on television is film. Advertisers have to sell us the lie that we're all the same, because if we believe we're all the same, we'll all want to buy their product. The fact is, we're not all the same. The rest of us understand that, and that's why we like to go and watch television and see movies and theater – not to see ourselves, but to see something different. PLUME: And also, to a larger degree, the attitudes of advertisers are based on perception on whether something would be the case, rather than reality... MCKELLEN: I fear that the wonderful British television program Queer as Folk is going to be made into an American television series. They're changing one of the central characters ages from 15 to 18, because they're frightened about what the audiences and the authorities might think if they showed a 15 year-old having gay sex on television – but that is the point of the story. That's rather like saying, "Hamlet isn't a university student – he's a happily married man of 35." You've got to laugh. I laugh at them and get on with my life. PLUME: And why is Hamlet's father dead? That's unhappy... MCKELLEN: You can only speak from your own experience, and my experience is that it has been entirely beneficial, to me personally – to my career, to my life, to my relationships, to my relationships with my family, to my love-life. If you talk to other gay men and women and ask them do they regret coming out, I bet you wouldn't be able to find one of them who would answer that they did regret it. I have to think selfishly that it's been good for me, it's good for other people and – in the end, and importantly, really – it's good for the world. I'm not trying to solve the world's problems... Just my own. PLUME: We'll move on to the next film... Apt Pupil, which was also your first time working with Bryan Singer... MCKELLEN: There was a part I didn't think I could play. It was a fiendishly difficult accent – a Germanic/Californian mix. He was 20 years older than me. I seemed to have pulled it off. I had a really good time, but I like dressing up and putting on make-up and a disguise, at times. PLUME: Do you think, as an actor, the make-up aids your getting into the character? MCKELLEN: It's a great joy you have as an actor, when you're suddenly looking at yourself in all this make-up and you look in the mirror and do the voice, and suddenly you discover your shoulders have gone into he right position and the hands are doing what they should be doing. Someone who's seen that movie – someone I didn't know and a rather senior person in the industry – went out of his way to call me up and said, "You are so brilliant, because I know that is how people of that generation used to hold their cigarettes when they were smoking them." I hadn't thought about it – I hadn't done any research. I just happened to be doing it right, because I'd looked in the mirror and there was the man in front of me. That was the joy I got out of playing that part. PLUME: What was your experience working with Brad Renfro? MCKELLEN: Brad couldn't be more different from me if he tried. He's a great deal younger, his interests are not mine – he likes the sort of music that isn't to my tastes – his experience and his private life are quite other than my own, and I am English and he is American. But, nevertheless, we became good friends and we worked as well as we could together, I think. It was the differences between us, I think, that were surprising. PLUME: But those were the differences between the characters in the film... MCKELLEN: Appropriate, yes. PLUME: How would you describe your experience working for the first time with Bryan Singer? MCKELLEN: Well, it must have been good, because I've just been doing it again. Bryan and I became friends before we became colleagues at work, so each time has been a joy to know that I was going to see my friend at work. What I admire most about him is his taste. I think he's got an immaculate sense of style, and that's a very important thing if you're a director. PLUME: That brings me to X-Men, which drew you out of your sabbatical... MCKELLEN: Yup. PLUME: What drew you in, when you read the script? What was strong enough to pull you out of your respite? MCKELLEN: I was intrigued about being involved in something which was potentially going to draw in a wide, popular audience. I thought, as a piece of very popular entertainment, that it had every chance to work. The fundamental argument between the X-Men and Magneto is one which applies to other minorities – and, in a sense, gay men are mutants, Jews are mutants... Any minority is likely to consider the argument between Xavier and Magneto. Do we integrate? Do we play down our differences? Do we assimilate? Do we appear normal? Or do we, in Magneto's view, declare our differences, be proud of them, and even prepare to fight the majority? That's an interesting dilemma, isn't it? You don't find that in all the comics that have been filmed. I wasn't sure that I could do it... I don't know that I have done it – we'll have to wait and see. PLUME: This was also your first big "special effects" movie. What difficulties were there in dealing with that? MCKELLEN: It's not as difficult as it seems, because any set you stand on – in the stage or a film – is likely to be incomplete. It can be very thrilling when you're on location and to be actually there – have to be in a room with four walls and somehow the camera's squeezed in with you. Even then, you've got 50 other people who aren't meant to be there, because they're all behind the camera. In other words, the circumstances you're working with are always you and the audience, you and the camera – what's behind you and around you is not incidental, but it's very rarely complete, so to be doing a scene in front of a blue screen isn't that different from doing it in front of a perfectly crafted piece of scenery. It's not that different, really. PLUME: Was there anything that struck you as particularly difficult about the filming? MCKELLEN: Well, it was very cold at 3 o'clock in the morning in Canada, but I was fortunately able to wear thermals. Poor Rebecca Romijn-Stamos was stark naked, so she was the brave one – not me. PLUME: And you enjoyed your second outing with Bryan Singer? MCKELLEN: Yes, I did. He shouted at me as usual, but that's alright. PLUME: How would you describe working with Patrick Stewart? MCKELLEN: [Our scenes together are] not extensive. I think the focus of the movie is not so much on them, as on the fortunes of Wolverine and the characters as a whole, so it was a team event. Patrick and I have worked together once before, but even if we hadn't, it would have felt as if we had, because we're very similar. We've had very similar careers. I know, of late, he's shot into the stratosphere – almost literally – but his sense of humor is very much mine. He's a Yorkshireman and I'm from Lancashire, and Lancastrians and Yorkists were fighting years back in the Wars of the Roses – so Xavier and Magneto are still fighting it out. Off-screen, we enjoy each other's company, I think. PLUME: Should a sequel be in the cards, you wouldn't mind re-teaming with the entire group again? MCKELLEN: It would depend on the script... However, I am under contract to do it if it happens. I would hope I liked the director, I would hope the part was well-written and the story worth telling, but if that was the case, to meet up with them all again would be very joyful, I think. PLUME: So you enjoyed working with the other actors as well? MCKELLEN: Oh, yes. I had come across Hugh Jackman before and admired him onstage – he's a great fellow, and the others, too... All of them. I had a particularly good time. PLUME: That brings us to the continuing adventure in regards to the filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy... MCKELLEN: Anyone interested in the answer to that question should read my diary, which comes out about once a month on my website. I've been telling the story of that as it proceeds... I did the same thing with X-Men as well. Peter Jackson says it's the biggest film ever made – the most ambitious film ever made, in terms of logistics and technicalities. It's an absolutely mammoth project. What's rather appealing is that it's all happening in New Zealand. It's a New Zealand film – it's financed from America with a few foreigners like myself brought in to help out, but it was dreamt up by a New Zealander, directed by one, the script writers are New Zealanders, most of the crew are... The amazing effects and props and costumes will be designed and made there in workshops. It feels like making a home movie, in that sense. Everyone's friends and knows each other. It's very pleasant to visit them, and they live in the most beautiful landscape – which, again, are New Zealand and very crucial to the effect of the film. It's a moving and important myth that you are involved in, so it's totally satisfying. PLUME: And, again, it was the script that brought you to it? MCKELLEN: I think it was meeting Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, his partner. They have an air of hippie-dom about them, but what I mistook for being hippies is, in fact, that they are New Zealanders. They're modest people... They're passionate... They're not showy people... Their egos are nicely in place. They're not related to the rat race at all. They know they live in the most beautiful country in the world, and they have no ambitions to leave it, and they're very happy to have invented a structure there whereby they can make – and hopefully pull off – this amazing project. When you're there, you feel there's nothing much happening in the whole world but his film, so that's rather alluring. If you're making a movie in Hollywood or London, well, the Queen lives in London and Spielberg lives in Hollywood – there are other things going on. But in New Zealand, it's just us, really. You sense that, "Hmm... This is something really important." PLUME: And you've gone from portraying one iconic pop-culture character, in Magneto, to another, in Gandalf... MCKELLEN: In a year's time or so, my Magneto doll will be able to zap my Gandalf doll, and I don't know who's going to win. PLUME: And who would you prefer to win? MCKELLEN: Oh no, no... I don't take sides with my characters. PLUME: Do you enjoy portraying Gandalf? You get to portray many different shades of the character... MCKELLEN: There's Gandalf the Gray and there's Gandalf the White, yes. I've nearly finished with the Gray now. We've nearly finished the first film, but done lots in the other two, really. I think Gandalf the Gray is my favorite. He's more human than Gandalf the White... he enjoys a smoke and the company of the Hobbits and lets his hair down a bit, and relaxes and makes jokes. PLUME: With Gandalf the White being more straight-laced... MCKELLEN: Well, with Gandalf the White, he's really up against it and the stakes are higher. He's come back and he really has to complete the job, so he hasn't much time for relaxing and fooling around – he's got to get on with the job. PLUME: Speaking of getting on with the job, as we wrap this up, what is in your future? Do you have any projects locked down yet? MCKELLEN: No. It'll probably be a play, because I want to do a play soon. I was thinking the other day, "Hmmmm...What would it be fun to be doing when Lord of the Rings opens in Christmas 2001?" I thought the really cheeky thing would be to be doing a musical on Broadway, but I don't see one in the offing. There are a couple of films that are there, but I'd be surprised if I didn't do a play next year sometime. PLUME: Is that generally your way of getting a change of pace and unwinding after a film? MCKELLEN: Not necessarily... I went straight from X-Men to doing Lord of the Rings, but I will have been doing film non-stop for 18 months. I miss the theater. I don't pine for it, but every so often I think I'm going to need to do it again. Again, the circumstances would have to be right, and it would have to be a play I really want to do and a director I really want to work with and I have to make sure the theater is the right size... All those sorts of things. If they all come together, I think that's the thing I'll be most likely to be doing. PLUME: As a way of wrapping up completely, if you looked at yourself right now and said, "This is where I am right now..." What would you say? MCKELLEN: Professionally – completely fulfilled. Personally – I don't intend to go into it. PLUME: Perfect answer. MCKELLEN: Talking about actors coming out... When actors say, "I don't talk about my private life." I say to them, "Nor do I." Nobody knows who I fancy or who I sleep with, and nobody knows the sort of food I like or what I like to do in my spare time – I don't talk about that, but I'm not going to lie and say that I've got a girlfriend. -- Kenneth Plume FilmForce » 10 Questions » Interview 10 Questions: Ian McKellen We run our ten questions by Sir Ian, the embodiment of Magneto and Gandalf. December 12, 2001 - Sir Ian McKellen has appeared in more than 40 films in the course of his career, as well as scores of theatrical productions. Most recently, genre fans came to know him as Magneto in the first X-Men film, and he'll soon be seen onscreen as Gandalf in the first installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring. When we last talked to McKellen (in our big 4-part interview, which starts here), he discussed his start as an actor, his views on acting, entertainment and filmmaking today, and his work on Richard III, Gods and Monsters, Apt Pupil, X-Men and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. In the meantime he's kept in frequent touch with his fans at his official site, McKellen.com. Now Sir Ian checks in with us to share his answers to our ten questions... 1. What is your favorite piece of music? Brahms' 4th Symphony. 2. What is your favorite film? Jacques Tati's Monsieur Hulot's Holiday. 3. What is your favorite TV program, past or current? Newsnight – BBC2's weekday current affairs program. 4. What do you feel has been your most important professional accomplishment to date? Co-producing, co-writing and acting in the movie Richard III 5. Which project do you feel didn't live up to what you envisioned? None as yet – lucky that I am. 6. What is your favorite book? The collected works of William Shakespeare. 7. If you could change one thing about Hollywood, what would it be? The myth that gay actors can't play straight characters. 8. If you could change one public perception of yourself, what would it be? Gandalf is thousands of years old – I am only (only!) 62. 9. What is your next project? After "Dance of Death" on Broadway, the sequel to X-Men. 10. What is the one project that you've always wanted to do, but have yet to be able to? Play "Dame" in an English pantomime. -- Kenneth Plume
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