Ian Mckellen Quotes
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Tolkien is as good as Dickens at sketching a scene.
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Gandalf saves the world and saves the soul of the world, really.
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Acting is a very big part of what human beings do. A dog is always a dog, but we're always changing.
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Bill Gallagher's new version of 'The Prisoner' is an enthralling commentary on modern culture. It is witty, intelligent and disturbing. I am very excited to be involved.
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Tony Blair is not a villain, but he's played the part very well.
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I'll never put my memoirs in print.
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There are some fantastic parts for older actors.
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I love the Broadway audiences, who relish live drama and don't hesitate to display their enthusiasm.
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I have heard of people dying from prostate cancer, and they are the unlucky ones, the people who didn't know they had got it, and it went on the rampage.
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I have little routines in the theater. Once I've established something, like the order of putting on makeup and a costume, I have to invariably do it in the same order every time, even if I only did it by chance the first time round.
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When I came out, I told my stepmother Gladys, and she just said she had known for years and was glad I wasn't lying anymore.
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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.
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I always walk up the escalator on the Tube, and I live in a house with a lot of stairs, and that's good exercise, but you need more than that.
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Because I was in the business of translating the 'X-Men' from the very successful comics, and taking the most popular book of the 20th century in 'The Lord of the Rings,' and making it into three movies, I hope people realize I wouldn't get involved in anything I didn't think was really going to be worth their while.
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Actors don't, in fact, retire, do they? It took me a while to remember that.
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If you are playing King Lear you are the centre of attention anyway. You don't need to draw attention to yourself. It's all laid out for you.
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You always think that 70 is the end of the road: 'Somebody died when they were 73; good life'. You're closer to death, and you better make sure you don't waste too much of your time doing things you don't want to do. No point in saying things you don't believe in.
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I don't think many people will re-read 'The Da Vinci Code.'
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If you've got Mystique as your girlfriend the fun you could have in bed – I've just imagined X-Men 3 might open with me in bed with Patrick Stewart.
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You put anyone in the outfit, and they look like Gandalf. Not that clever.
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I know actors who have had to turn down good roles because they just don't pay enough. It's hard.
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I've always had very catholic tastes.
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Ever since the invention of the camera, people have been trying to create 3D, because we see things in 3D, and everyone's aware that the camera doesn't.
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It's easier to go from theatre to film than the other way round. In film you're absolutely loved and cossetted and cared for. In film your director makes your performance. In theatre you're carrying it all.