{"id":95113,"date":"2014-11-29T06:04:14","date_gmt":"2014-11-29T11:04:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=95113"},"modified":"2014-11-29T06:04:14","modified_gmt":"2014-11-29T11:04:14","slug":"ian-mckellen-talks-on-gandalfs-last-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2014\/11\/29\/95113-ian-mckellen-talks-on-gandalfs-last-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Ian McKellen talks on Gandalf’s last day"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"GandalfBOTFAPoster\" Here’s the transcript of a long but very interesting roundtable question and answer session that Ian McKellen conducted with a number of reporters just before his final day on the set of the Hobbit as Gandalf. <\/p>\n

The transcript traverses not just his role — and legacy — as Gandalf, but also his Shakespearean endeavours, living in New Zealand, meeting Edmund Hillary, and the challenges that Sean Connery might have faced if he’d ever taken on the Gandalf role.<\/p>\n

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Question:<\/b> I think it was Richard Armitage who just told us that when he talked to you early on, one of the things you said was you think something’s going to end. But it turns out this is never going to end. Do you feel like you’re getting, sort of, towards the end of this or do you feel like it’s never going to end?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> I know. Well, it isn’t just that your work that seems to be ongoing, although I am doing my last day tomorrow as Gandalf, ever. As things stand. Because the films go on, they don’t just get released. They get released on DVD, and I suppose most people have actually watched Lord of the Rings and maybe The Hobbit at home, they haven’t been to the cinema. And they watched it over and over again in a day. <\/p>\n

I talked to someone whose four-year-old. Oh, it was Bill Kircher’s daughter, four. They’d shown her the DVD of The Hobbit and she watched it five times in the day! So, how can it be over? You see what I mean? Wherever we go, we’re associated with it. So, it’s a permanent part of your life and you can’t just say, “Oh, that’s it.” However, as far as the actual filming is concerned, I think it is it.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> What do you think tomorrow is going to feel like? How momentous does it feel the day before your last day?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Well, I’m going straight to another job and my focus, I suppose, will just– as I get on the plane will switch to that and there may be a delayed reaction. As I say, there are premieres, there’s AD art to be done, adding the voices. It isn’t “never see you again” sort of thing, it’s not saying goodbye. It’s not the break-up of a relationship.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Is tomorrow’s scene especially juicy or–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) I have no idea what I’m doing! No, probably not. They are genuinely pickups, these. So probably just to mend these scenes I’ve already done, but I’m sorry, I don’t know what it is I’m actually doing.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Is there any comparison to the two experiences? Do they feel very similar? Do they feel very different, the two trilogies?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> I don’t know, really. It all seems very much the same. The cast has changed a great deal for The Hobbit. Not many of us left. But behind the camera, hundreds of people are the same. I knew Melissa thirteen years ago. Enough said. The director, the writers, the cameramen, his team, the riggers, the best boys, my make-up artist Rick Findlater, Oscar nominee. <\/p>\n

Emma, who dresses me, was doing it thirteen years ago. So, that all seems comfortably like coming back to family. This used to be a tent, literally a tent. You might think it’s a bit blowy now, but it was just a canvas roof. It was, you’d light your own hands when the Southerly was blowing in here. <\/p>\n

You felt the whole thing would take off. It’s all a bit more bedded down, our studios are more state-of-the art and expansive. The Lord of the Rings was shot in studios A and B. Go and have a look at them. One’s an old paint factory. <\/p>\n

Now we’re in these great, big comfortable, waterproof, soundproof, heatproof studios, so that’s different. The 3-D doesn’t make any difference, it’s just a camera. You don’t know what’s going on. There’s been less travelling around, there’s been less stuff on location. We had a glorious two months, was it last year, or the year before?<\/p>\n

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\"vlcsnap-2014-11-07-05h48m50s135\" Question:<\/b> Twenty-eleven, yeah?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Was it two years ago? Well, eighteen months ago. We were on the road there for two solid months going from location to location, and that was thrilling. And I felt there was a lot more of that with The Fellowship, and that probably reflects the sophistication of the technology, which has improved so much. There is one big difference between when we started out. It was with some trepidation that a group of people started to make a film of the world’s most favorite novel. A lot of people were very doubtful that the film should be made. <\/p>\n

And the airwaves– The Internet was just starting up thirteen years ago. They were letting their worries be known. Was the casting of Gandalf quite right? Some people thought it was inappropriate for a gay man to play this heroic character. Was Peter Jackson up to the job? Nobody knew. Everyone was very nervous. Now, Peter started talking to those people and trying to reassure them, and I did, too. And I think it turned out to be the first blog any actor had ever made in history. <\/p>\n

I called them “e-posts” unfortunately. A phrase that didn’t catch on, but I was blogging there and it was all defensive action. Once the first film had come out, we came back here to do pickups for the other two films, knowing that we’d made a film that millions enjoyed, therefore we were now making films that millions were expecting, looking forward to. <\/p>\n

And that was, for me, a huge change. Very, very rare that you do a job knowing that the audience is desperate for you to do that job. Most films you make don’t get released, is the fact. So, when we came back to do The Hobbit, it was a little bit of, “Ooh, should we be trespassing on this kids book that so many of us have enjoyed?” “Yes, we probably should.” “And would millions be waiting to see it?” “Yes, they would.” <\/p>\n

So, there was a lightness of spirit here that these were films that we wanted to make and that others wanted us to make and that’s a very unusual position.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> You’ve got Gandalf, and you’ve also got Magneto, as well. Did you ever see yourself so entrenched in popular culture in two thousand and thirteen?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Well, I suppose the most popular writer in the world over the centuries has been Shakespeare, so I’m quite used to being involved in popular drama. I think it would be a pity if you went through life as an actor and didn’t actually acknowledge that there are some forms of entertainment that actors get involved with that are more popular than others and I’m aware that a lot of what I do doesn’t either appeal to people or because it\u2019s in the theater, doesn’t reach them.<\/p>\n

And film, of course, there’s a much wider audience. No, but it’s just chance, isn’t it? I’ve just come back from doing another X-Men with Bryan Singer in Toronto, just before I came here. No, Montreal, sorry. Well, I don’t know. It’s just a fluke and it tickles me, really. <\/p>\n

And some places I go, they think it’s Gandalf walking in, and some think it’s Magneto. And it’s interesting that sometimes those audiences don’t cross. The X-Men audience doesn’t always know about The Lord of the Rings. It’s funny, isn’t it? But, there we go. And I don’t mind that one little bit, being thought of as either of those characters, because I admire them both, really.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> But there are still people in London who approach you about play X or play Y that you did over the years, right?<\/p>\n

\"Gandalf McKellen:<\/b> A few. And I hope in New York, as I’m about to do Waiting for Godot and Harold Pinter’s No Man’s Land in repertoire on Broadway with Patrick Stewart and two wonderful American actors. Yes, I hope they haven’t forgotten.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> You said that there was some trepidation for coming back to the movie, because in the book Gandalf doesn’t have a whole lot to do other than point and say, “You need to go here, I’m going to go away for a while.” And now we know that Fran, Phil and Peter have expanded the role and brought a lot of the appendices stuff in. Now that you can look back, that you’re at the end of your shooting, are you happy and content with the stuff–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) I am happy. If you’re suggesting I mightn’t come back as Gandalf because the part wasn’t good enough, that wasn’t quite it. It was just a sense that I’d done it and at my age, each job might be your last. Did I want to be knocked out by an Orc forever more, when I could’ve been doing a play somewhere? In the end, there was no choice. He had to come back. I don’t think anybody refused. <\/p>\n

I was the beneficiary of dividing the plays into three, onto two because much of Gandalf’s story was well on its way to completion at the end of the original first film. There wasn’t much for him to do in part two. Now it’s all been split up, in the way it has, Gandalf’s shared over the three films in a way that is appropriate, I think, because he’s a major force. <\/p>\n

You can say that they’ve put in some new stuff. All the stuff that Gandalf has in this film was originated by Tolkien, in the appendices and elsewhere. So he knew where Gandalf had gone off to. He just didn’t put it into The Hobbit. <\/p>\n

But, by the time he’d done Lord of the Rings, it looks pretty clear that it is the same Gandalf, it is the same character, and to link the two films thematically through him and others is appropriate. I don’t have to defend the Jacksons. They’re perfectly capable of looking out for themselves.<\/p>\n

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\"THE Question:<\/b> When you come to work, and you’re going to be Gandalf today, is it a pretty comfortable process? You’ve spent a lot of time in the robes, I guess. Is that pretty–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) I’ve been trying to find out how many times we’ve put on the nose and the wig and the beard and the staff. Nobody seems to know. But somewhere in the records, it must be and I don’t know whether it’s in the thousands of days. It probably isn’t. It is a routine. I go to work, I get up, I come into work, I don’t live far away, it’s an easy drive. I go in to see Rick forty-five minutes later, having had breakfast in the make-up chair I emerge as Gandalf. That’s no effort at all. <\/p>\n

And poor old Dwarves in the same trailer have been there since half past three or four in the morning, wearing masks and false heads and all sorts of prosthetics. Ah, they’ve been so good-natured about it, but it’s been difficult. In comparison, I just sort of get ready. In the theater I quite like the time between getting changed in the dressing room and leaving the day behind and knowing that now I’m going to be in this situation with this character I’m playing. And the forty-five minute series is a useful time to forget everything and concentrate on the day ahead. So, it’s easy<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> These films, in a way have introduced New Zealand to a global audience. And tomorrow’s your last day. How close do you feel to New Zealand as a country at this point, having spent so much time here?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Yes, well the trouble with New Zealand or me in New Zealand is that I live in a country which couldn’t be further away if it tried. So, I can’t nip down to New Zealand, in the way that I can nip to Paris in three hours from London. Or even New York on a fast plane. But New Zealand, it’s a journey and a slog and a commitment, isn’t it? But having lived in the same place and the same area on all the occasions I’ve been here, different houses but always looking out on the Wellington Bay, that’s absolutely in my heart now. <\/p>\n

One way I get to sleep is by sitting up, drawing Karaka Bay in my imagination, walking around the headland, climbing up those stairs now that didn’t used to be, there used to be just a rough path up onto the top and looking down into Breaker Bay and marveling at it all. So, yes, I suppose it’s close as any place that isn’t home. My favorite part of the United Kingdom is the lake district in the north of England, the, still, quite rural and mountainous. Not as tall as the mountains here but. I wouldn’t be surprised if some people hadn’t emigrated from the lake district and arrived in New Zealand and thought, “Oh, this feels like home.”<\/p>\n

When I met Edmund Hillary, who was a big fan of The Lord of the Rings, claimed he read it three times each year, couldn’t believe his luck to be having supper with Gandalf. The first mountaineering he did after climbing Everest was in the lake district on his way back here. But he was the only Kiwi I really knew about. I’d heard how beautiful the country was from other actors who had toured here. <\/p>\n

\"THE I remember arriving on my first day and Peter Jackson said, “What do you want to do while you’re in New Zealand?” I said, “I want to meet Edmund Hillary.” He said, “Well, give him a call. He’s in the telephone book.” Wow, that’s a big difference between New Zealand and other countries. If you’re celebrated on the whole, you don’t put your number in the telephone book elsewhere, but you do here. I went to see his widow quite recently in Auckland. I think the spirit of the Kiwis is so wholesome and sensible, modest, and would hard-working be another quality you’d want to praise them for? <\/p>\n

If I had children leaving school, I’d send them to New Zealand for six months. There is another way of looking at the world, and it’s down here. Don’t be fooled because they all speak English. They are different. There’s a cultural difference towards life and what it’s about. And you meet people on this film, talk to them about why they’re doing what they’re doing, they all have a passion for it. They’re very common-sensical about it. And much as they enjoy it, probably what they’re looking forward to at the end of the week is going fishing.<\/p>\n

I met the leading dancer with Royal New Zealand Ballet Company, after he’d given a pretty startling performance. And I was asking did he get many days off, he said he got Sunday off this week, and I said what was he going to do and he said, “Oh, I can’t wait to go fishing.” Well, I don’t think there’s another premier dancer in the world whose real passion would be fishing. <\/p>\n

But in New Zealand it seems about right. You talk to people who’ve change their jobs because they weren’t getting enough satisfaction out of life. And that satisfaction wouldn’t be anything to do with status, and it wouldn’t be anything to do with how much money they were earning. The modesty that you see in the way people behave to each other and dress and everything else is absolutely genuine. And that I tend to admire. That accords with what I like about people.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Have you taken any of your days off to go fishing since you’ve been doing this?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Fishing– I mean, I’ve never fished. The idea bores. Well, I feel rather sorry for the fish. You’re very close to the moment of having killed another being, aren’t you? Although I did once see a man near where I live in London in a little marina there and he’d just caught a huge carp, I suppose it was. And he was cradling it. And I said what was he going to do with it? <\/p>\n

He said he was about to put it back. To let it go. And he was just checking it was all right. And he said, “I’m really fond of this fish. I’ve caught it six times.” So maybe there’s something about fishing I just don’t know about. But I think fishing here, on the whole, is catching fish to eat, isn’t it? Yeah.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> If you’re not fishing in your leisure time here in New Zealand, what do you do?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Well, I haven’t had much leisure time this time, but in the past, I sometimes got weeks off at a time. And I went around the place as a tourist. I drove around, went north, went south. Friends would come out, I’d go repeat journeys that I’d enjoyed. I’ve done a lot of that. Because there’s so little theater and live entertainment compared with living in London, I keep an eye out for it and see if there’s anything that I want to go to. <\/p>\n

So, a comedy festival I’ve been to a lot. I’ve been to a number of classical concerts. There was a brief jazz festival recently I went to. So I’ve kept in touch with local live entertainment. A bit involved in gay issues. It doesn’t seem as if New Zealand needs much help in racing into the twenty-first century. They’ve just established gay marriage in advance of most countries in the world. And I help out there a little bit. I accept invitations. <\/p>\n

And otherwise, just live. Often just settle down in my house. I’m looked after by Steve who is my cook, masseur, driver and knocker-upper, which means knocking on the window, “Time to get up.” So I’m often at home, eating homemade food, looking out on Wellington Bay. Living here, not visiting.<\/p>\n

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\"hobbit_gandalf\" Question:<\/b> Do you ever hope for your legacy as this particular character? Is there something that you hope gets communicated to future generations in this performance?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> I don’t know about that, but I suppose if I’d ever had ambition in films, it would be to make a classic film that would go on being watched long after shooting was over. It’s alluring, that. In the theater, you do a performance and that is it. There’s another performance coming up tomorrow, eight of them in the week, but different audiences each time, different experience for them, and therefore for the performers. <\/p>\n

It’s for the nonce, it’s for now, it’s immediate, it’s live. You could say, negatively, that cinema is dead, because by the time the audience sees it, the disparate parts have separated and some of the performers may indeed be dead, whose performances you carry on enjoying. So that is quite different from the theater. And I feel rather detached from it, so I don’t have any responsibility. I don’t know where the film’s being shown at any one time or who’s watching where under what conditions, but that it is being watched and enjoyed and, more than that, relished and loved, and to have been part of it–I have to speak, in the past, really–has been wonderful. <\/p>\n

And then in the present, goes on being wonderful because I meet people whose lives have been affected by it, often quite young people, who love Gandalf. They often refer to him as their grandfather. Yes, that’s lovely.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Looking back to when you first accepted the role to today, is there anything that you wish you’d known back then that you know now?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> No, I don’t think so. I don’t know. Yes, any experience is different from what you’d expect, isn’t it, whether it’s a holiday or a relationship or a job. I think if I’d known when Peter and Fran showed me the designs for Middle-earth in nineteen ninety-nine that actually what they were saying– And, “We want you under contract until two thousand and thirteen,” I think I would have thought twice. <\/p>\n

\"Galadriel But as it’s happened, as it’s rolled on, intermittently, of course. I’ve had some wonderful jobs in between times– No, I don’t think so. There have been no big difficulties, obstacles to overcome. So no, I don’t think so.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Do you know what the theater performances are that you did for the longest time, for the most shows?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Well, I did– I don’t, because although I’ve done long runs without a break, I’ve also done plays in repertoire which have been revived over years. I know I did a lot of Macbeths. I may well have the record for playing Estragon in Waiting for Godot. I’ve done three hundred and forty of those and I’m about to do some more on Broadway. Amadeus on Broadway was ten months.<\/p>\n

How many performances is that? Quite a lot. But I’m not in the thousands. I do like it when you can be in a play which gets revived and comes back and circumstances change and you do it again. If it’s a great play. But actual figures I don’t have.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Well, are there any similarities to returning to Estragon after years away from it to returning to Gandalf, to returning to anything that’s been in repertory that you take a year or two or three off from and then come back to?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> No, because this is a different script and a different situation and a film with a different tone to Lord of the Rings. Godot remains the same script. And crucially one or two bits of the cast and the same director. But it doesn’t seem odd to me to come back to something I’ve already done. The question is is there going to be enough– Are you going to enjoy it? Is there enough challenge remaining?<\/p>\n

I think back, two or three years ago we’d be sitting here now with Guillermo del Toro having just finished these films. How different would that have been? I don’t know. He and I got on very well and were talking about Gandalf. I think the films might have looked different. But I don’t know. We’ll never know.<\/p>\n

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\"Ian Question:<\/b> For you, at a time in life when other actors might have started having a hard time finding great roles, you got two that were both iconic. What did it mean for you to have that happen for you when it happened for you?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> You’re not really aware of it until it’s happened, really. Male actors have it over women because there are some fantastic parts for older men. King Lear, Falstaff, Prospero, many other parts in Shakespeare. Women run out of parts in Shakespeare. And that’s sort of spread over other work as well. We do have it easier. <\/p>\n

There are some fantastic parts for older actors. And if you’re still game and you’re still in the business and you’re still hale and hearty, then you may be lucky enough to land them. But the way you get parts is– Everyone assumes you get a good manager, get a good agent, you’ll be fine. Well, maybe. But perhaps when you’re starting out that would be a big bonus. I still don’t know why I got Gandalf. In fact, I’ll ask Peter tomorrow, on our last day. Because the rumor was that other actors had been offered it and turned it down. That would be likely, wouldn’t it? Such a wonderful part that you’d go initially for perhaps a known actor, which I really wasn’t in film terms. <\/p>\n

But before Peter Jackson asked me to play Gandalf, Bryan Singer asked me to play Magneto. That came first. And when the X-Men dates changed, I had to call Peter up and say, “I’m sorry, I can’t play Gandalf because my initial commitment has changed its dates.” And it’s only because Bryan Singer is a gentleman and talked to Peter Jackson and they agreed quite unofficially, nothing in writing, that Singer would get me out of X-Men in time to do Fellowship of the Ring that I was able to do both parts.<\/p>\n

Now, how did I get Magneto? I do know how that happened. Bryan Singer had seen me as Richard the Third, and that was the beginning of my film career. I made a film which I produced and I co-wrote the screenplay. And it was noted in Hollywood that Ian McKellen was for the first time in the film industry. <\/p>\n

\"LOtR He wasn’t one of those actors who shouts in the evening, as we call it, in the theater. So Singer saw that, was casting a part in Apt Pupil of a Nazi. It was similar territory to the way I played Richard the Third, and he met me and said, “I’m sorry, you’re too young. What a pity.” And we then talked about other things, including John Schlesinger, who we are both big fans of, an English film director whose last film pretty well was for BBC, Cold Comfort Farm. <\/p>\n

And I’d played a ranting preacher in that. And Bryan asked me, had I seen the film, not knowing I was in it. So I said I had. He said did I know the actor who played the part I played. I said, “Yes, it was me.” He said, “But you were so much older in that.” I said, “Well, it’s acting, isn’t it?” And then he cast me as Dussander in Apt Pupil. But if I hadn’t, on a whim really, done that film for John Schlesinger because I had always admired him– Very difficult film to make, on a very low budget. <\/p>\n

And successful as it was, the BBC were not interested in the film being shown in cinemas, which was Schlesinger’s hope. Schlesinger personally paid to transfer it from sixty millimeter to thirty, whatever it is.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Thirty-five mill?<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Thirty-five. Without that determination, it probably wouldn’t have been shown in a place where Bryan Singer would have seen it. Nothing to do with agents. That’s to do with luck and what’s in the air and people’s tastes and people getting on together. I got on with Bryan from the word go at that first meeting. We’re good friends.<\/p>\n

How I got Gandalf, I don’t know what they’d seen. They must have seen something that just sort of clicked. I know I had a big fan in Philippa Boyens, who of course is very close to the Jacksons, and she’d seen me play Macbeth and she still– She talked about it the other night to me, and that was forty years on. So maybe when my name came up, she was able to be enthused. But I didn’t do an audition. I didn’t put on a wig.<\/p>\n

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\"Gandalf\" Question:<\/b> For what it’s worth, Peter told me you were always his first choice. There was other actors that he went to– Yeah.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) Really? I was his first choice, but he went to other actors first?<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> It was the studio. The studio might have–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (interrupts) Studio.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Yeah. And that actor very famously talked shit about the role. He talked publicly about it.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Did he?<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Yeah. And before he turned it down. That’s how the studio knew that this actor turned it down.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Who was this? Sean Connery?<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> (overlaps) Connery. Yeah.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> He didn’t like the part?<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> He said he didn’t understand it. And nobody would have understood him in the part, so it would have been–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> I can see Sean Connery as Gandalf. I can see lots of actors a Gandalf. It’s such a strong personality that it would stick to whoever was playing it, I think.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> But you were able to disappear in Gandalf, though. You’re able to bring your power and your presence to it, but I don’t– I look at Connery, and he would have been Sean Connery in a robe. And especially at that stage.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) Well, he would have had that disadvantage that he was already extremely famous as another character. Yeah.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> And he probably would have punched Peter, because that’s what he does to directors.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) Does he? He probably wouldn’t be sitting where I am now, He probably wouldn’t have done The Hobbit, would he? So somebody else might have gotten a chance. Who remembers now that Richard Harris ever played Dumbledore? I think The Hobbit would have survived somebody else playing Gandalf. I’m sure of it.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Well, as a fan, we’re glad that you came back.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Well, thank you.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> So, Ian, in the third film particularly, lots of the characters in the film have some real drastic changes, some really severe character arcs, but Gandalf is solid and a lot the same. Are there some Gandalf moments in the third film, some iconic things or some–<\/p>\n

\"IanMcKellen:<\/b> I’ve, on a number of occasions, had to say to Peter, “We can’t do that, Peter. We did that in Lord of the Rings.” I think there might be a couple of– Yeah. I think the scene molded in, noted between Galadriel and Gandalf, where there’s a personal tenderness between them which pays off in the third film, that’s something a bit unexpected. <\/p>\n

No, he’s just going about his job of looking after Middle-earth and all its inhabitants as best as he can. Yes, there may be one or two moments, but you can never quite be sure what they are until Howard Shore’s come in.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Well, Gandalf gets to be a bit of an investigator in this one, which is a little bit–<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) Yeah.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> It’s definitely a different side to him because in Lord of the Rings there’s a clear mission. They know exactly what has to happen after the first half hour of the first movie, they know the ring is the ring that needs to get destroyed, that’s A to B. But here, he’s having to go by instinct and emotion.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> (overlaps) They know how to get rid of the ring because Gandalf knows.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Yeah, absolutely.<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> Gandalf is an investigator, yes. Compared with the other wizards, that’s his specialty. He’s not the philosopher, he’s not the man in touch with the animals in the way that Radagast is. Nobody knows what those two nameless wizards– The Blue and the Green, I think. I don’t know.<\/p>\n

Yeah. Tolkien doesn’t bother much about them. Gandalf is on the road, that’s what he does. He listens to people, he’s sympathetic to them, he has an overall view, and then he gets extremely bossy.<\/p>\n

Question:<\/b> Are you going to cry? Any chance you’re going to cry? [Ed note: question is implicitly referring to whether McKellen will become emotional after filming winds up for his role.]<\/p>\n

McKellen:<\/b> I don’t– When we finished the other trilogy, it was a big day, the day you finished, for the principal actors. We’d finished shooting and they said this is the last day for whoever, everyone went away, the actor got changed, and everyone came back. People didn’t go home. They waited.<\/p>\n

And I remember my last day was out here in the car park, the battlements of something or other, Minas Tirith. And Peter, Barrie Osborne, the producer, stood up there and they showed a film all about me. Five, six, seven minute film, full of fun, jokes, moments you wanted to remember. And then you were called up and you were given your sword. Which I still have at home, of course. And there was torch light. <\/p>\n

You couldn’t help being moved by that. We’ll see if anything similar happens tomorrow. I suspect it will just be b’bye. “Bye-bye, Hobbit, bye-bye.” I don’t know. But yes, I should be very sad to say goodbye to some friends. But I sense that why won’t we be meeting up again in a few years’ time? We probably will. It’s possible, isn’t it?<\/p>\n

\"Ian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s the transcript of a long but very interesting roundtable question and answer session that Ian McKellen conducted…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":94026,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[22,4,49,5,29,31,30,148,1636,2490,2497,1911,149],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-hobbit-movie","category-mckellen","category-lotr-movies","category-fotr-movie","category-rotk-movie","category-ttt-movie","category-hobbit","category-the-hobbit-an-unexpected-journey","category-the-hobbit-the-battle-of-five-armies","category-the-hobbit-the-battle-of-the-five-armies","category-the-hobbit-the-desolation-of-smaug","category-lotr"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/vlcsnap-2014-11-07-05h54m24s123.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tLoH-oK5","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95113"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":95134,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95113\/revisions\/95134"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}