Sir Ian McKellan at 82: ‘I’m Having the Time of My Life’
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Sir Ian McKellan is the cover subject of Sunday’s The Guardian newspaper’s magazine The Observer.
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The Observer: “Oh, birthdays,” Sir Ian McKellen growls, on the occasion of his 82nd. “At my age I don’t do birthdays.” The wider world has not yet been informed, however, and cheerful cards have come in stacks to McKellen’s London townhouse. Messages chime in on his computer and two landline phones ring on his desk, one after the other. “But, darling,” McKellen says, answering a call and interrupting a well-wisher mid flow, “I’m trying to avoid it all this year.” Guilt, he explains to me, later. He leads us through to a sitting room. “Actors don’t need this special attention, I’ve realised. We get cards and presents on first nights. Everyone makes a fuss of us. Birthdays are wonderful things for people who don’t get treated as special all year round.”
“When I was young I was always playing old parts,” McKellen says. “And, of course, I was having to imagine it. Because what does ‘old’ mean? I had no idea! Now that I’m old I do know. And I also know what it’s like to be young. Because as you get older, inside, you’re ageless. Inside? Quite honestly? I feel about 12.”
A word, here, about his face. Fixed to look craggier when he played Gandalf two decades ago, it has since caught up with some of those ageing effects achieved by the Lord of the Rings cosmetics team. In a funny way this has made him appear more youthful, though. When you look at the pictures of McKellen turning 50, for instance, cutting his cake backstage at the National with a prop sword, he was skinnier, moustached, rather terrifying. Now the laughter lines are more pronounced around his eyes, creating the pleasant impression that he’s always fresh off a giggle. His grey hair, tufty and short, skews off at a million angles in a way that fashionable young men will strive after. He says that, in rehearsals for Hamlet, cast mates of all ages have said they keep forgetting whether he’s 80-odd or 30-odd. “I’ve been having the time of my life.”
