Ian McKellen

Ian McKellen
Image from Extras
Date of Birth	25 May 1939
Place of Birth	Burnley, Lancashire
Education	St. Catharine's College, University of Cambridge
Occupation	Actor
Partner	Single
Parents	Denis Murray and Margery Lois McKellen
Children	None

Sir Ian Murray McKellen (born 25 May 1939), is an English stage and screen actor, the recipient of the Tony Award and two Academy Award nominations.

Career

McKellen has had a successful acting career in both theatre and film work. His most famous film roles include Gandolf the wizard in the Peter Jackson trilogy, Lord of the Rings and Magneto in the X-Men trilogy alongside Patrick Stewart. He has also appeared in the films Apt Pupil, Gods and Monsters, and The DaVinci Code. He was also the narrator for the film Stardust.

Extras

McKellen played himself in the fifth episode of the second series of Extras written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. His character was directing a play called A Month of Summers, a love story about two gay men, and Andy Millman was cast as one of the leads. Andy eventually ruined the play on opening night when he refused to kiss his costar. His performance earned him an Emmy nomination in 2007.

Quotes

• McKellen: Peter Jackson comes from New Zealand, says to me, “Sir Ian, I want you to be Gandalf the wizard.” And I say to him, “You are aware that I am not really a wizard,” and he said, “Yes, I am aware of that. What I want you to do is use your acting skills to portray the wizard for the duration of the film.” So I said, “Okay.” And then I said to myself, “Hmm, how would I do that?” And this is what I did: I imagined what it would be like to be a wizard, and then I pretended and acted in that way on the day… And how did I know what to say? The words were written down for me in a script. How did I know where to stand? People told me. If we were to draw a graph of my process, of my method, it would be something like this: “Sir Ian, Sir Ian, Sir Ian. Action. WIZARD! YOU SHALL NOT PASS! Cut! Sir Ian, Sir Ian, Sir Ian.”
• McKellen: How will you know what to say? Well the words will be in the script...and you will learn the words! You would not have the script on the night and that goes for everybody, there will be no scripts on the night! You learn the words!'
• McKellen: George, can you get us some Vaseline?

External Links

• Official Site
• IMDb Profile
• Internet Broadway Database