WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 621 - Ian McKellen

Episode Date: July 19, 2015

Sir Ian McKellen turns the garage into a master class as he tries to help Marc develop a better understanding and appreciation for Shakespeare. Along the way, they talk about what it was like growing up during World War II, why he felt liberated as an actor when he came out, what he likes best about his role in “Mr. Holmes,” and the real reason he keeps agreeing to play Gandalf. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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maron this is wtf my podcast welcome Hello. Hello into your head. Hello you there on the treadmill, out there on the sidewalk perhaps, running with your new running shoes. Be careful. How's it going in your car? Everything okay on the tube? Are you okay on the tube? How are you on the subway? Everything all right? Are you going into the tunnel? Are you out of the tunnel? How's it going? You there on the airplane, you okay? Hi. Yeah, you. That's right.

That's right. You can read and listen to me at the same time. I'm okay with that. What do you got there? Did you go with the vegetarian option? Hi, how's it going? You sitting at home on your computer taking a break from washing the thing how how are you doing there in your cubicle at work is this funny to you is this look around look around you're the only you know fuck

those people look around yeah fuck all of them right right am i right yeah that's right you get are you smiling now are you smiling oh be cool be cool people are gonna wonder what you're doing i i am mark maron did i mention that nice to see you. Nice to talk to you. I did a lot of work. I finished signing 1,000 of the books that I bought surplus of my books. They're all sold out. Thank you. There's still plenty of different marination tour posters at wtfpod.com slash merch. There's a few mugs. Go to BrianRJones.com and you can get the WTF mugs, the fancy ones, the hand-thrown ones. I think there's a few left. Try it. You know, Brian can only make them as quick as he can make them. He's a potter. He's got a child. All right. He's a potter with a child. Can't spend a lot of time on the wheel when you got a young child in the house.

I'm on the wheel when you got a young child in the house. So maybe there's some there. So Sir Ian McKellen is on, and I was excited and nervous about this. Today he's also on The Nerdist. He's promoting Mr. Holmes, and sometimes we get our guests, while they're running around doing the promotional thing. I just got a text from Chris. Where is it?

Hey, I just heard this is Chris Hardwick on my phone in a little talkie balloon. I love the idea of cross-promoting, so I'm happy to tell TELS folks, it says TELS, in our intro to jump over to WTF for some sweet double Ian McKellen podcast action, and I will tell you the same then. Because the weird thing about podcasting is that

I think we all have different styles. Maybe you want to take this opportunity today to enjoy the different styles that Chris and I have and also to enjoy Sir Ian McKellen in two different formats. Now, I'm going to have to listen. I'm going to have to listen to the Nerdist to see how it went over there. I don't do that.

I've got nothing against Chris. I just don't have time. I'm too busy listening to stacks and stacks of records that's my that's my my second job oh and i signed 1 000 books not complaining but it was a work day today a lot of manual labor with the sharpies hey can i reach out to sharpie and say how about making a fucking pen that doesn't dry out you know if you've left the cover off for 12 seconds? How about one of those? Do you have one of those? I know you make a retractable.

Sometimes those are okay if you retract it. And I know that's on me, but let's talk about the cap thing. Seriously. If I got a Sharpie and I'm using it and I set it down for 15 seconds, perhaps to get another thing that i'm about to write on it's it's it's fucked it's gone am i missing a trick what's happening this is like an anti-ad for sharpie so yeah i was um i was excited and a bit nervous to talk to a sir ian mckellen because um i mean i've seen enough of his work to know who he is. But I also know he's a Shakespearean actor. And as some of you know, my experience with Shakespeare has not been great. Okay?

I don't always understand Shakespeare. I think that's the wrong way to put it. I don't take the time to wrap my brain around the language uh in order to understand shakespeare and i'm going to talk to ian mckellen sir ian mckellen about shakespeare i think that's reasonable and i hope you enjoy that i don't you know i i'm starting to think that one of the reasons cats have a somewhat detached or or um mysterious or even nasty disposition. Do you ever really consider the amount of times you wake your cat up from a nap? Could you imagine if someone did that to you?

Like as soon as you get like you're a half hour into a good nap and someone just comes over and starts rubbing your head. Yeah, I think that I think we underestimate the rage inside a cat just from that, just from the fact that we wake them up from from naps almost constantly let's talk now but this is my conversation um with sir ian mckellen uh his movie mr holmes is out now and uh and that is a sherlock holmes movie although not uh the exact sherlock holmes you you know and uh and and see how you enjoy my conversation with Sir Ian McKellen.

And feel free to compare it with Chris's, Hardwick's that is. This is a big day. This doesn't happen too often. And it's never happened where we both have the same guests. So I'm going to go and listen to his. All right, here's me and Sir Ian McKellen.

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Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton. The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction. Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5 p.m. in Rock City at torontorock.com. The President of the United States was here three weeks ago. That's his cup.

He left his cup. He sat right where you're sitting. Fantastic. It was amazing. He came to my house. Was he excited that he knew I was coming? Yeah, I told him. That's the only reason that he decided to do the show.

He was on the fence initially. So how do people refer to you? Sir Ian? No, Ian. It'll do. You want to wear headphones or no? You want to just pull the mic closer to your face? You know, like doing a voiceover.

Perfect. Beautiful. And what did you talk to him about? I talked to him about, we ended up talking about race, about weapons, about his life as president. You know, how he handles it. His wife, his children a bit. It was a tight hour. Do you think you got something out of him that other people didn't?

Well, I got to have a one-on-one conversation with him in this intimate setting, which I think tonally sounded different than anything he had done previous. And what was his motive, I suppose? I think it was to sort of reintroduce himself on some level to the American people. I think here in this country, you know, sort of reintroduce himself on some level to uh to the american people i think here uh in this country uh you know people become detached they uh the president sort of fades into the background eventually and i think that he was is seen as a lame duck at this point and i think he thought that by using uh this show he could sort of connect to people that may have

become a bit apolitical and uh show a different side of himself. And I think it worked. Good. And did you have a sense of who's downloading you, listening? Sure. They're presumably getting in contact with you. Well, you know, my audience tends to be sensitive, slightly aggravated people, usually intelligent of all ages. I don't think I have a demographic.

I think it's more of a disposition that seems to arc from 13 to 80. But, you know, good people, generally speaking. And I need to ask you about some things because, you know, I'm not dumb, but I have not... I'm just one of these people that I have this conversation before.

Are we on now? Sure. Okay. Sure. So, I... That's what the other guy did. We started talking, I was saying a few things.

I said, hang about. Yeah. It's being recorded. Oh, sure. Well, yeah, that's right. I wanted, for the record, you to know that Chris Hardwick, the other guy,

stole that from me. As long as I can touch the President's Cup. I'll let you do that. But I imagine you covered The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings fairly thoroughly. Well, that's all rather old news. However, I mean, the fascinating thing is that although I haven't been to Middle Earth, as it were, for a long time now, those movies are still current because, of course, people watch movies at home all the time. They will be forever current with a certain part of the population.

Yes, I know. And it's a bewilderment to me. Is it? Well, you know, you do a job and there we are. You made a film. But, oh, 15 years later, someone comes up to you. I've just seen your movie. Oh, yeah.

And you're usually quite a young person. Yeah. No, that's very gratifying. Yeah. We only act to get a reaction from an audience. Right. So when you get the reaction, it's precious. Yeah.

Even if it comes years later. Yes. Well, there's no more late to the party. The party's ongoing. And you can come in whenever you want, as if it started. Okay. But my question is, knowing your history, is that I need somebody to make me want to understand Shakespeare. And I don't know if you can do that.

Well, that's what I've spent a lot of my life trying to do because Shakespeare means a great deal to me and my colleagues. And we know that your life's going to be enhanced by being familiar with those amazing stories and amazing language. So I had a show called Acting Shakespeare. And I talked about Shakespeare. And the Shakespeare I was talking about was the acting Shakespeare the uh the Shakespeare who often gives his characters at some moment of stress in their lives uh they express that uh with a metaphor which is to do with acting all the worlds are staged right sure all the men and women merely players yeah the exits and the entrances and I think one of the Shakespeare's messages is,

if you understand that about human beings, that we are all actors, it'll illuminate your life. And, well, what does that mean? Well, when you get up in the morning, you decide what costume you're going to wear. No, absolutely. Sure. Now, you're quite relaxed here. Yeah, as are you, I will add. Should we reassure your listeners that you are fully clothed but relaxed.

You are a knight with a hoodie. Correct, and a t-shirt. But, of course, you dress here in this part of the world because of the weather. But if you and I were going out this evening to some event, we would change our costume. And clothes express as a part of our uh nature animals don't do that animals always stay the same sure they don't need clothes they don't wear clothes they don't understand clothes they don't understand presentation of themselves and and what's more we not only change our costumes but we change our language too i remember at school like

i had a different accent at school it was a broader northern Lancashire accent in the north of England but was that that was natural to you though it was something like this it was quite broad when you were a kid yeah I can pick up the difference yeah sure of course but at home where my parents didn't speak with so strong an accent I changed my voice so and I'm capable of doing that because I'm a human being, because I'm an actor. And you adapt. We're all actors. And we love pretense and we love using our imagination and we love just showing a different side of our personality in different situations.

A dog is always a dog. That's right. And that's why dogs are so funny. Yeah. Because they get into situations where it's not appropriate for dogs, and we laugh. Right. And they change emotionally. They can be needy or mean.

They're playing one part. That's right. That's the point. There's a slight emotional range. In the way they look. And probably they've only got one bark. Yeah. But a couple different sounds.

But when you were younger, where did you grow up exactly? In the north of England, in the industrial north, in a county called Lancashire. It's where the Beatles came from, near Liverpool. Did you see the Beatles? It's the greatest review I've ever had is when I was opening in a play in Nottingham, in the north of England,

and the Beatles of England and the Beatles were playing at the local cinema. So before they were big. And the critic said, I was so taken with Ian McKellen's performance that it reconciled me to missing the Beatles. Oh, isn't that nice? I think that was before they came to America. We should just go back to Shakespeare.

No, we are. I just wanted to know how you came. You're conducting this, not me. No, no, but I mean, it's interesting to me that you grow up, and I know Shakespeare is sort of ingrained in British culture. Well, it's possible, as I did before I went to college at age 18. I suppose I'd seen half of the 37 Shakespeare plays. And what sparked that desire in you?

Because maybe as an American and as someone who's lazy, I can't get past the languages. And I'm an English major. And I somehow avoided Shakespeare because I can't follow the emotions. I can't follow the story. Well, that's a pity. And you perhaps didn't see very good actors doing Shakespeare.

It is difficult. You have to learn how to do it. It's as difficult in its own way as singing some Mozart. Okay. And you're not going to get Mozart by looking at the score on the page, are you? That's right, no. And you're probably not going to get Shakespeare just by reading it for yourself. You have to hear it out loud.

And an audience, of course, audio, are listeners before they're spectators. And so if you get practiced performers of Shakespeare, it's more likely that you will be able to understand it because they understand it. I watched William Hurt, I think, butcher Richard II once. All right. It was a little difficult.

There you go. If you want a good introduction to Shakespeare, it's not too late, you know. No, no, I know. I'm looking forward to it. Okay. You should get the DVD of Macbeth, one of Shakespeare's best and shortest

and most popular plays. With Olivier? No, no, no. With Ian McKellen. Oh, okay. Hold on, let me write that down. You won't be able to spell it and judy dench uh a great uh british actress was playing lady macbeth and it was directed by the man who at the time is running the royal shakespeare company so this was a group of people who really cared about shakespeare

and we did it in a very very small theater for 100 people and that adapted very easily to to the television screen where we didn't have any scenery it was just the actors uh and and uh their voices uh and my sister who when she was a teacher used to play it for her uh little girls of 12 13 and she'd leave them in the room she'd pull the blinds down and she'd put it on the screen. And she'd stand outside and wait for the first scream because it's a very terrifying play. It's about magic and witches and danger and murder and blood. And look at that because it's probably, I'm not the only person to say this, the most convincing screen version of Shakespeare that you can get. There's no spectacle. There's no scenery.

There's no weather. It's just the voices, really. But you can see the faces. And I would be amazed if you had difficulty understanding it. It's very, very simple. I'm going to do that. I'm going to do it. And it's going to start an entire new period in my life well i hope so yes so as as you're how old do you do

you talk about it what how old do you do you uh 76 so you were born in in england and on the just before the second world war in 1939 so it was a rough start. Well, it's true. The first three years of my life I didn't sleep in a bed. I slept on a mattress under a metal table in our downstairs room in case a bomb knocked the building over.

And blackout material so that the lights didn't attract any German bombers that were coming over. Do you remember that? Oh, clearly. And not much to eat, but quite healthy eating, rationing. Yeah. But, of course, you don't, when you're growing up, know that that's not the norm.

And I was well looked after, a lot of love in my house. Yeah. It's interesting, in retrospect, to know that, like as an american person you know we never had experienced that and and and in really england was trashed it was destroyed parts of it yeah although we were living in a relatively safe part of the country so safe that when when families were evacuated forcibly by the government they They were told to leave their homes in dangerous places like London and Birmingham. A family came to live with us.

Mrs. Levick. Mr. Levick was left behind. Firefighting. And two kids came to live with us as well. And I said in an interview like this, I think on television in England quite recently, I don't know what's happened to the Levicks. If you're watching,

get in touch. And they have done. They did? They have done. The kid, the girl who's now my age, I suppose, she's living in Canada. She's a grandmother. Oh, that's beautiful. Isn't that lovely? Yes. So there were excitements in the war

of a good sort for me. Other people had their houses bombed and died, of course. War is no fun. It's horrible. And how many siblings do you have? Just one elder sister who's dead now. Sorry.

That's all right. And what kind of household was it? What did your old man do? What did your father do? He was a civil engineer and a pacifist, but he didn't have to register as unavailable for fighting because his job was thought to be too important because he was running the water and the energy supplies

and the street lighting and the buildings in the town where we lived. He was able to serve. Some people had to just stay at home and keep the place running. So he got a reasonable salary. And I remember celebrating the day that he earned £1,000 a year, which would be, in those days, probably $3,000.

But it's silly talking that way because the value of money has changed, of course. Yeah, and that was a big day, though. It was, yes. I think we had tinned oranges that day. Sounds good. I'm not sure what it is. Well, it's oranges in a tin.

Can of oranges. A can. A can. Sorry, a can. No, no. I picked up this in your driveway. Is that an orange? It's a little fruit.

I think that came off a palm tree at some sort of unedible date, I believe. Oh, there's a date in there, is there? Yeah, but I don't think you can eat them. Okay. I would have known because I like to eat, so I would have known. I'm going to take it as a souvenir. Sure. Did the president take a souvenir from him?

Just happy memories, I suppose. Very happy memories. He calls me every day. No, I have a beautiful hand-thrown mug I'm going to give you as well at the end, if it goes well.

Good. How are we doing so far? Great. So, in your mother, did she work? Well, no, she worked as a running the house and two kids and and these evacuees who were living with us so she had to sort it was a whole family was a mother and a children yes but my

mother cooked a full-time job isn't it running a house uh but it was in the days when on the whole women didn't work right all mothers didn't work sure they were doing that job but before that she'd been a secretary and by the time well she died when i was 12 so whether she would have taken up a job after that i wonder yeah uh so you were young yeah oh dreadful yeah and your father's passed away too huh well now he has yes yes yes. And when did you begin to, you know, know that you wanted to act? It's a very specific type of acting you did for a lot of years. Hmm. Well, I think my next job is going to be to try and write a memoir.

And that simple question is probably going to take up a couple of early chapters in the book. Well, we've got about, you know, we've got maybe five, ten minutes to spare. early chapters in the book. Well, we've got about, you know, we've got maybe five, ten minutes to spare. But simply, my sister and my parents enjoyed going to the theater, the live theater. So you went as well as a kid. So they took me along.

And I liked it too. And I think I liked it more than they did. Shakespeare? Yeah, my sister took me to Macbeth, the play we were mentioning, when I was about eight or nine years old, and I went to production. And another play, Twelfth Night.

Those are my first two Shakespeare. Do you remember who was in it? Oh, I do. Keith Sykes. These were amateur productions in the local community theatre. And I enjoyed it so much that I wanted to find out how it was done. What's behind that

curtain? In those days, the curtain went up. Look at that scenery. But when they leave the stage, where do they go? That's the question I wanted to answer. And the way to answer it was to become an amateur actor myself, which I

did at school and elsewhere and uh i got backstage which was the real thrill to me oh that's how they do it it was when they pull that that happens i see and then there is a the tradition of shakespeare company is that everybody is really involved at all levels right i mean that you know you're doing some stage work you're doing oh i see yes. I suppose that's true. I mean, I'm glad I didn't become a stage manager. Right. Just dealing with the objects that are needed to help tell the story.

No, I found out that I had an aptitude for, I suppose you'd call it showing off. I like drawing attention to myself, but not as me, but as the character I was playing is the interesting thing. Because all the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players, I suppose. I was just doing a fairly human activity of pretending. But you didn't necessarily think you as a person were that compelling? No, and I didn't think I was a very good actor either. So although I did a lot of acting at school

and then later at Cambridge University with like-minded scholars who intended eventually to become professionals, I didn't. I just enjoyed acting and didn't think I was good enough because I'd seen some very good actors on stage and I knew that I wasn't

any of that so who were the guys that that sort of blew you away at a young age that you would watch and be like that is transcendent like who who is the one that delivered the message of Shakespeare to you uh in in terms of of humanizing it and dramatizing it perfectly. Peggy Ashcroft. Uh-huh. Now, Peggy Ashcroft was on a level with Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson, Orson Welles, those sort of people who, names people might still remember. And she was the leading actress,

I suppose, of her time. And I saw her do a great deal and was riveted and overwhelmed. Did you meet her? I did meet her, yeah. Oh, yes. We became quite good friends because she was a very open, friendly person. Although I did work with her a little bit eventually. I couldn't believe my luck.

That's amazing. But not in a play ever. On platform performances, readings, and that sort of thing, yeah. Uh-huh. But there's a whole... It wasn't one act or it wasn't one production. It was just the whole theater-going experience

that I wanted to get by being on the stage rather than in the audience. And how do you, you went to Cambridge? Yeah, I went, like you, I majored in English, but didn't do enough work. I was in 21 undergraduate productions. There wasn't a drama faculty there, we just did this in our spare time. Right. And when did you do the formal training for acting? I didn't. Really? I never have done, which is why I'm still learning. Yeah.

You know, I think I judge each job still, but am I going to learn anything? Uh-huh. At the end of this, am I going to be better? Uh-huh. I mean, I hope to give the audience a good time, but I feel I'm a craftsman, you know. I'm still trying to make that perfect table, you know. And there is no such thing. So on we go.

So it's a constant, my work is a constant interest to me because I know there's no end in sight. I haven't found out yet how to do it. Oh, yeah. You really feel that. I do. But you, like, more than anyone, and I've never had a night in here. Have you not? No, the first one. But, you know, you spent more time- Have you spent a night in here? No, never got that bad in the house.

Even with several troubled relationships, I never got so bad. Almost. But you spent more time on stage than you have, you know, on television or in movies, really. I mean, the stage was really... Well, I've made, on average, a film, either for TV or the cinema, one a year. So that will add up to about 60 films. You haven't seen or heard of any of them because they weren't worth it.

But every so often, luck strikes, and you're in something that catches the public's imagination. But I still, I suppose, if I want to define myself, think of myself as being a theatre actor. That's where I'm most at home. It's difficult to be at home in a studio. There's so much going on. There are so many people. Although you've got a part to play, it is only a part.

And what really is happening is a bit bewildering but in the theater when it comes to delivering the story to the audience who's there yeah and you go from the beginning through to the end the director is nowhere to be seen the lighting guy uh is in the little box you can't see him the designer is on doing another production, and it's just the actors and the audience, and that's when I'm at my happiest, really. It's so immediate. You can feel the life of it. It is happening now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's that human level of direct communication, which is why at times I rail against the technology that mobile people communicate so readily these days. But we need, I think, for our health's sake and to confirm our humanity, we need actually to look people in the eye. Right, yeah. As well as hear each other.

I mean, here we are having a perfectly sociable conversation but you're wearing earphones. I mean, why, and I've got an earphone on.

Why don't we just take them off and talk? We can. Do you want to? No, but this, it's okay. I've got used to the idea

but No, I know what you mean. Microphones in the theatre are absolute death to what I consider life. I will not use a microphone in the theater. But you don't have problems with the hearing impaired having amplification, do you?

No, well, of course they must have that. No, but the point about audience, I go back to that audio, is that when your emotions start deep down under that big muscle, it's called a diaphragm. It's below your lungs. And as you feel things down there, it affects the way that you speak because it's pushing the air up in a particular way. And this air comes up through the body and then at the throat and into the mouth through all those most intimate parts of your body, love-making places like tongues and cheeks and lips.

And through there it goes. It can be measured as it travels across the air and it lands on your eardrum and your eardrum vibrates and your ear and my diaphragm are connected. Put a microphone in the way. Yeah. Not the same.

Not the same. Not a human exchange. It isn't, no. I think that's true. And I think that when you talk about theater, because I don't go to enough theater, and I know that. I've done plays and I enjoy seeing plays, but over time, they're part of you. If you're not a theater lover or a regular theater goer you

start to be like well is it a good play you know so yeah how how is that thing but every time i'm there even if it's an experimental performance you cannot it's undeniable the the risk of human engagement which i think might be why people don't go as often as they should, because theater, you know, for generations, has been thought of as sort of a community lifeblood of connection and creativity. But I think it's... Well, in the most primitive of societies,

there will be storytellers, and people will gather around to listen. Yeah. And, you know, before people could read or write, the great stories were passed down orderly. Yeah, Homer. Homer, you know, before people could read or write, the great stories were passed down orderly. Homer. Homer, absolutely.

Homer wasn't a person, but what we know is that whoever wrote them or first spoke them, they were repeated by people who had learned the words, not having read them, and passed them on. And it was all at that very human level. It's bizarre to me because I do stand-up. Oh, do you? Yeah, yeah. And I recently did...

No, you use a mic for that. Right. But what I did recently, I was at the Opera House, the BAM in Brooklyn, and I was performing. Yes. And I very consciously, because I knew the venue could handle it, that it was designed properly. So there were portions where I would step aside from the mic and get right up to the lip of the stage and engage like that. Good for you.

But the difference is insane. I mean, it's like the difference of how people listen. Yeah. That they're not allowed the distance anymore. That's right. Absolutely right. And Tony Bennett does that to great effect. At the end of his set he always puts

the mic aside and sings and that's the magic moment it's beautiful that's what you remember that's what you really want all the time but it's difficult

because you know that's a big theatre you're talking about I've worked there myself but yes you it's not that long ago that people didn't use microphones

because they hadn't been invented at all and opera singers still don't use microphones that's right yeah that's the thrill of opera do you understand other languages that people didn't use microphones because they hadn't been invented. At all. And opera singers still don't use microphones. That's right. Yeah. That's the thrill of opera.

Do you understand other languages? No. Oh. Opera's tricky. You kind of... Well, I go and see opera or hear opera sung in English. Oh.

Because, like, I watched one and they literally have subtitles for it. Oh, well, yes, you can do that, yes. Yeah, but then that's distracting. Yeah, yeah. But what do you think, like, you know, as somebody who lives on the stage and when you do, like, yes, you can do that, yes. But then that's distracting. But what do you think, like, you know, as somebody who lives on the stage, and when you do, like, let's say Shakespeare,

and you're doing one of Shakespeare's plays that you've done many times, and maybe you're with a different cast than you've been previous, is it always a different experience emotionally? Is there moments where something resonates differently every night, or is there a consistency to it resonates differently every night or or is there is there a consistency to it well it's bound to be different isn't it because you're 24 hours older than you were right you last did it right but do you find new things in shakespeare all the time yeah no you'll never get to the end of shakespeare yeah isn't that

interesting uh so and is it different? Yeah, of course it's different because the audience is different. Is a lot of it the same? Yes, of course it is. You've got to honor the script. Yeah, and more than half of an actor when he's acting is awareness

of what's going on and the technician in you. But there has to be room for the unexpected, the surprise. And you can only do that, of course, if you're working well with the other actors because you have to do it together. Tell me about an amazing surprise, either for better or for worse, in the middle of a play.

Like, have there been times where, you know, where something goes awry that sort of you'll never forget? Well, I worked once with a director called Mike Alfreds, who was very influential on me. Because he prepares and rehearses a play with his actors so that anything can happen during the performance and that... Anything. And that everything is genuinely improvised. And so his rehearsal, his preparation,

is all about discovering everything possible you know about the characters so that when you enter the stage, it doesn't matter where you stand on the stage, and you can walk and be wherever you want on the stage. Nothing is set. Nothing is fixed. You're speaking the words. You come onto the stage at the point at which the text says you should,

and you leave it the same. But in between times, the level of intensity of the emotions will depend on how things are going tonight. Uh-huh. Oh, yeah. And his instruction is, you must reach a level of reality. It doesn't matter how low and insignificant it seems to be. If it's real, work up from that.

Don't come on and do that wonderful thing you did last night, which everyone is thrilled about. No, don't do that, because they will not be thrilled, because it won't be really genuinely in the moment. So, you're asking me about something exciting that happened. It wasn't to me, except that I was in the audience when it happened.

He was doing a production of by Anton Chekhov, the Russian player, who is my second favorite playwright. Which play? It's called The Seagull. Yeah. A classic. And it's all about acting, actually. It's all about theater,

rather. Anyway. A boy entered and he was reading a book. Important. Had to do that. It's in the script. But he dropped, the actor dropped the book. Yeah. And he did what anyone would do. He picked

up the book, but somebody else got to the book first and picked it up for him. Yeah. And of course they got it in their hand and they opened the book to see what he'd been reading. And they reacted, and the play was going on, but there was this book. Suddenly, an important character in the play. And the book went down on the desk. The boy didn't have the book anymore. Somebody else wandered over and thought they'd have a look at the book.

And they did and after as I said to the director that's business with the book how long did that take to rehearse it's never happened before it's just impossible so it's impossible in his productions to do anything wrong if something goes wrong it's right

you know what I mean the spontaneity is the point. Right. But you can only do that if you know everything about the characters and have not limited your knowledge to just what you decide to present to the audience. Everything is available for you. So that's almost an ideal for me. Difficult to accomplish, and everyone's got to be on the same side very much.

To live in that moment. Oh, very difficult. Who are your favorite, you know, who are your favorite Shakespearean characters to play? Like, what do you like doing over and over again?

Oh, I see. Well, Macbeth's passed me by now, but I was in a wonderful production and perhaps there's not much point in trying to do it again. Anyway, I'm too old. Right. Macbeth's passed me by now but I was in a wonderful production and perhaps there's not much point in trying to do it again anyway I'm too old so a lot of parts have gone

passed me by you just end up with Lear at the end and I've done Lear's and I've also done Prospero in the Tempest but there are plenty of old men left but they're not necessarily the leading parts which I may be grateful to in my dotage. I don't want responsibility of carrying the play.

But Lear, was that exhausting and exciting? I played that at BAM, where you were. Yes, it's one of the most tiring jobs you could possibly get, because for the first third of the play he pretty well never stops talking and he's going through dreadful dreadful uh physical and mental decline and uh he's behaving out of character and being absolutely horrible to his daughter and yeah uh you're you're at a constant level of high uh emotion anger and and uh and regret and bewilderment and I suppose going

mad in front of the audience's eyes. And you do that for an hour, an hour and a half. And when Shakespeare very kindly gives you a rest, and he does, most of the big characters have a good time off stage. Oh yeah? We were in

Brooklyn and I come to the pause for me in the play, which happens around an intermission, so I had about nearly an hour off stage, although I was playing King Nick. That's the way it goes. And I did what I always did during the show. I lay down on the sofa and tried to get some sleep,

knowing that my dresser would wake me up in time to get onto the stage. However, we're in a strange theater, a new dresser, a local person who didn't quite know the play. And when he realized it was time for me to get ready he popped into the dressing room and couldn't see me because I was on a sofa I was covered up with blankets yeah and cushions against the sound of in the theater and I was obviously sleeping quietly they couldn't find King Lear he was asleep eventually someone more familiar with my ways that then this dresser shook me to life and and i ran down onto the stage just to meet two very bewildered actors who'd been ad-libbing

shakespeare for the last three or four minutes which is no easy task no i did apologize to them an awful lot now when you do leer at the age you're at does does do you do you know how does how does that that affect you i mean how i mean because i imagine it seems to me that like if the story about in the one story that i know about the difference between a shakespearean actor and say an actor of another sort a method actor or somebody who comes from the inside first over the outside. Does it become risky for you at your age to do something like that? Does it inform, is it frightening? It's frightening to the extent that these old boys are old

and you think of them as far distant from yourself until in the early 70s you play a man in his early 80s who is going mad. Well, it's a bit close to home. Same with Mr. Holmes. The new movie, yeah. The movie I'm doing at the moment, I'm playing him when he's 93 years old.

And the conceit of this movie is he's the real Holmes. He's the real Holmes, yes. And he's basically retired. Correct. Holmes is a real person, and his friend, Dr. Watson, wrote these fictional accounts of his life, and they weren't necessarily accurate.

And he didn't wear a deerstalker, and he much preferred a cigar to a pipe. But that only matters to Holmes in that, in his retirement. And he's not worked for 30 years. And Dr. Watson is married and long gone dead, I think. He has a puzzle about the last case that he failed to solve the case that sent him into retirement 30 years before and as he's declining physically and mentally excuse me he he we see him just coming back from a long journey to japan just after the last war where he's been looking for some elixir of life

to give him the energy, to bring back the memory so that he can solve this last puzzle because he knows it's important and he can't die until he's done it. An unclosed case from 30 years ago. Correct. Which Dr. Watson had written down as solved with all his customary flair. As a fiction.

As a fiction, but Holmes knew that the truth was other. And what that other is, is what the film is trying to uncover. And it turns out that he very nearly fell in love. And if he had done, he would have been a different Holmes and it would have been a different life. And in discovering this, he opens up his heart. It's a wonderfully sentimental, happy ending. Oh, good.

A happy ending, because the Holmes that you're left with at the end is a Holmes who's reconciled to himself, understands himself, and is nicer to everybody around him because of it. I should have my father see this movie. Yes, well, what's rather nice is that a lot of old people like it because it reflects interests that they have.

I mean, what do you do when your body's going and your mind too? And you have unresolved shit. Absolutely. But it also appeals to younger people who perhaps think perhaps i better attend to things now while they're happening rather than leaving it too late it's interesting how hard that can be well that's life isn't it well yeah you know you get old in your eyes i can't believe for so many years i was such a uh you know obstinate or stubborn or what you used to be angry about you can't even understand anymore

well how could i have been angry about that for so long exactly exactly life is very very difficult which is probably one of the reasons i'm an actor because acting is very very easy in comparison with life and you can process big things yes and and it's all written down for you and you know how it's going to end and you know what happens next. Unless you're in one of your friend's plays which could go either way. Anything could happen. That's right. But I think that in terms of your life

that you relieved yourself of the burden of being closeted at a fairly young age which I think was a profound decision, right? Well, it didn't seem a young age to me i was 49 oh okay 49 all right but you know there are gradations of coming out it's a journey that people go on and the but the people who are close to you knew right they they did oh absolutely right people i worked with right people who employed me. No, there are two areas of my life where I was closeted, crucially with my close-blood family,

my stepmother and my sister and my aunts and so on. And then a little bit of coming out journey, which most people don't have to worry about, which is talking about it publicly on occasions like this. And I had never done that either. So when the government was passing a particularly nasty anti-gay law, which I took... Personally?

Very personally. I got angry and I kicked the door open and said on a BBC radio program that I was gay in debating this particular law. What was it specifically? What was it restricting? Well, Google it. Section 28 of the Local Government Act.

And it said that because gay people have only pretended family relationships. Oh, my God. Therefore, it would be illegal to talk positively about homosexuality in any school. Oh, that's bizarre. Yeah. On the grounds that if you were to do that,

you would be promoting homosexuality. You would be encouraging kids to become gay. Right. As if such a thing were possible. Right. Any more than it's possible in my view to encourage gay kids to become straight. So it was a horrible law but incidentally it is the law which has just become the law of Russia. Throughout Russia it you may not on the grounds that you may not promote homosexuality, you can't talk positively about gay issues

to anyone under the age of 18. That's the law in Russia. It's insane. It is insane and cruel and unfair and ridiculous and antisocial in every possible way. So, in debating that with someone who approved of this new law, it was only too easy for me to say, well, you stop talking about them, you're talking about me.

Shut him up. Yes. And of course, I haven't... That was a great moment. It was. I haven't shut up ever since. And so it was hugely important to me because it was a great relief i didn't understand that i'd been censoring myself my life had been perfectly easy i'd been getting along

all right what do you mean you didn't understand it was just the way it was that you i assume that that's the way it was. You behave a certain way. You're gay. You may not show your affections in public. You may not hold hands with the person you're sleeping with. You can't put your arms. You can't kiss them. You can't do any of the normal things like that.

You can't talk about it. You're different. And, of course, when I started out being sexually active, it was actually against the law to have sex. I have friends who were put in prison. Were they? Yes. They were discovered to have had sex. Wow.

You can't believe it, can you? For like a long time? No, a few months. Horrible. But it scars you for life. Of course. Knowing that that's a possibility, then you restrict yourself. And you see other people doing the same thing.

And you think, well, this is the way that life is. And you buy into the lie that homosexuality is unnatural. So there's a natural shame to it. Oh, absolute shame. And that's no way to live. So one, no. And that's no way to live. So one... No. And one...

And it's living in a closet. It's living in a place where it's dark and dusty with old things that aren't used to. And you don't like yourself, probably. No, you certainly don't like yourself. And nor do you much like society that makes you like that. What's your stop all that? Oh, the relief.

I can't imagine. The joy. Yeah. Pr proud to be gay no no proud to say i'm gay yeah glad to be gay yeah yeah wonderful word gay yeah before that it was queer you know yeah some clever activist said it's not working this calling ourselves queer. Let's choose our own word. What about blue now? Yellow. Gold. Gay. Gay is a nice word.

Well, there we go. So, and then everything in your life becomes better. I bet. All your relationships are improved. No, there was no backlash at all. None at all. Yeah. few death threats from freaks from just yeah from people who if they were intending to kill me

didn't have they yeah thank god i was living in a country where guns were not available yeah yeah Yeah. So better actor, I would say, a different actor. How so? Acting became no longer a release for emotions that I wasn't allowed to have elsewhere in my life. Do you think that maybe some of your desire to act was around that shame? I do. Really? I think that's true of a lot of actors are gay. Yeah.

So they're hiding. They're finding a sort of fulfillment. They're indulging pretend emotions. But all of the emotions. Yes. And to very big degrees. That's right. But when you're out.

You can have them in real life. You can. And on stage. And I can now cry on stage. I could never cry before. Really? How did you fake it? I was just, you just pretended.

It was fake. It was fake. My acting was fake. My acting was disguise. Now my acting is about revelation. Truth. Yeah. So everything's better.

So I can't stop talking and telling people come out join the human race right literally like open your heart yes of course allow yourself to be seen yes so you didn't you weren't able to cry for real on stage until you were older than 49 49 i think so yeah i was doing uncle varanya another Chekhov play and the the character reaches an emotional state and tears are appropriate

and one day they just it happens just happened was it a great day that must have been a great day well that's bewildering but

I'm crying a great relief yeah and and now when were you I I I don't do as much research as I should probably, but these different things that you were given in England, the commander of the order of the British Empire, being knighted.

Can you explain those a little? Because we don't have those here. You do. Well, most countries have civil medals. Right. And that's what they are. Quite a lot of medals are given out each year on the advice of the government, and the queen, as head of state, hands them out.

Yeah. She doesn't draw up the list. But she shows up for the knighting, I imagine. Oh, yeah. but she shows up for the knighting I imagine oh yeah and there's there are grades of medals knighthood surprisingly is not

at the top really there are others beyond that what are those are they secrets no no no I've got one of them I'm a companion of honor wow that's bigger than knighting yeah because there are only 68 of us. You have to wait for someone to die before you might be given the companion of honor.

And beyond that, there's another one, which is the order of merit. And there are only 25 of those. These are extremely distinguished people. So among the knights, it's like not a big deal anymore? Like, yeah, I got knighted. Well, a knight who draws attention to itself because it comes with a title. Yeah.

And I find that a bit of a bind. I mean, I don't want to be separated out from everybody else, but if the nation says to you, thank you. Here's a medal yeah hang it on the christmas tree which is what i do um wear it on sunday best occasions yeah uh why should you resist of course but when it comes to the title there's good reason to resist and and people do resist it. Sir.

Distinguished people have said, no, I don't want a knighthood. David Hockney, my good friend, the painter who lives close by here, he refused knighthood and others have done the same. But when it came to the Companion of Honor, he didn't mind because it was just two initials at the end of his name, which he could use or not. And nobody really knew. Right. What, there's a pressure to having a sir? Is it insulting somehow? It was just two initials at the end of his name, which he could use or not, and nobody really knew. Right. What, there's a pressure to having a sir? Is it insulting somehow?

Why would you resist it? By accepting an honor in the queen's name and implying an allegiance to a hereditary head of state, you're buying into that system of... Monarchy? Of monarchy. And on the whole, monarchy has its uses. It doesn't, does it get in the way? But I think perhaps it does, because it suggests there's a hierarchy in society, which is fixed at birth. Yes. You know, it's not an elected monarch.

Right. That's what you have. Right. So that's the statement. I get it. That I think we ought to have really and and if you accept a knighthood you're sort of saying well you bowed in front of the queen didn't you and she tapped you on the shoulder but how was that day

uh you're you're asking me to to to to reveal the the best bits in my upcoming memoirs. But what's the day like? Well, the day is very exciting. You're going inside a building that you don't normally get inside and going into parts of it where the public doesn't go except on these occasions. And you stand in line and eventually your name is called out and you step forward and there is this familiar person. Yeah.

Who you know so well. Yeah. And yet you never met her. She's out of my money. It is extraordinary. Yeah. But I like it because at that moment when the hand is shaked, you're shaking hand with the nation. That's her job.

She's representing all the people you know, all your neighbors, all the people you don't know. For centuries. Well, for centuries. And saying, we belong, we're together. And this person is there, and she's looking right into your eyes. What she's like as a person, that's irrelevant. Whether you would like her, who knows?

It doesn't matter. It's not the point. So it's a bit of high theatre going on. And you are, at that that moment playing a principal part. And you're playing opposite. Yeah. The queen. She doesn't have a name.

The queen. So it's quite delirious. But as somebody who we talked about earlier, that this human connection, this auditory this this this visceral experience did you feel it i mean was there what you know even with all the pomp and circumstance and yes but i would like it to be even more special than it was because unfortunately her conversation can't be Candid Particularly personal Right

And the last time I went to get a medal from her She said You've been doing this for an awfully long time Haven't you? I wonder if she knew what this was And I had the wit to say Well, not as long as you have been doing it, Mum. And the nation smiled and even had a little chuckle.

That's beautiful. But then she shook my hand, which is the formality. And the handshake, I'm afraid, with the Queen is not a shake up and down, but a push away. Oh, okay. You you feel it off you go yeah well because she's got more people to do she got to get through but you gotta laugh i i made the nation laugh yes that's a beautiful thing it's a very exciting moment so okay you know we've now we have a few minutes left okay Okay. Because you have to get back to Hollywood. These amazing turns of events in your career

where you play these recurring powerful roles in these fantasy pictures. Oh, yes. As an actor, and I know we briefly talked about it at the beginning in terms of it's just another job, but it's a good job, right? Actually. Well, no.

When you're asked to play Gandalf or Magneto again, you're like, yeah, of course. Well, I mean, have you been to New Zealand? No. But if you like living where you do, surrounded by sky and weather, go to New Zealand because they have more of it. It's beautiful, right? Overwhelmingly beautiful.

As you drive down some of those empty roads and surrounded by rapidly changing scenery, mountains and glaciers and volcanoes, mountains and glaciers and volcanoes, you hear yourself saying, I believe in God, because this couldn't just have happened. Wow. Yes, wonderful. So I've had three films worth of that, and then they say come back and do three more, and apart from the lure of New Zealand,

I couldn't have anybody else playing the gandalf. No. Anybody could play him. Right. It's easy. Sure. Put on the beard, put on the voice, there you are.

But I wasn't going to have Anthony Hopkins take over, you know. Yeah, not the cannibal. Uh-huh. Yeah, not the cannibal. Uh-huh. But if we're coming to the end of... I'm going to give you a bit of Shakespeare. Okay. I'm going to give you a little present.

Thank you. And... I just hope the publicist doesn't knock on the door in the middle of it, so let's do it. Well, that would be improvisational. Okay. Perfectly right. But this is a speech from a play that isn't in the Shakespeare canon

because he and others wrote it together. It's probably what they did in those days, rather like a group of people will write a TV series today. And the leading character is called Thomas Moore and Thomas Moore is a lawyer and he's sent out by the authorities to put down a

riot that's happening in the middle of London and the riot is all about the strangers and their midst immigrants people with eat food, smells different, they look different,

wear different clothes, different language and better send them back wherever they came from. And it's a special speech

not just for what it says but because it's a special speech, not just for what it says, but because it's the only speech that exists in Shakespeare's handwriting. Oh, okay. And there it is in the British Museum. Yeah. And so you think, oh, this must have meant a lot to Shakespeare.

Oh, yeah. And this is how it goes. So someone in the crowd shouts that the strangers should be removed. And Thomas More says, grant them removed.

And grant that this your noise hath chid down all the majesty of England. Imagine that you see the wretched strangers, their babies at their backs, and at their poor luggage plodding to the ports and coasts for transportation, and that you sit as kings in your desires, authority quite silenced by your brawl, and you in rough of your opinions clothed what had you got? I'll tell you you had taught how insolence

and strong hand should prevail how order should be quelled and by this pattern not one of you should live an aged man for other ruffians as their fancies wrought with self-same hand self-reasoned, and self-right,

would shark on you, and men like ravenous fishes feed on one another. Oh, desperate as you are, wash your foul minds with tears, and those same hands that you like rebels lift against the peace, lift up for peace. And your unreverent knees make them your feet to kneel to be forgiven. You'll put down strangers, kill them, cut their throats, and lead the majesty of law in Lyme to slip him like a hound. Say now, the king, as he is, Clement, if the offender moan, should so much come too short of your great trespass as but to banish you, whither would you go?

What country, by the nature of your era, should give you harbour? Go you to France, or Flanders, to any German province, Spain, or Portugal, no, anywhere that not adheres to England, why, you must needs be strangers. Would you be pleased to find a nation of such barbarous temper that breaking out in hideous violence would not afford you an abode on earth, whet their detested knives against your throat, spurn you like dogs, and like as if that God owned not nor made not you, nor that the elements were not all appropriate to your comfort, but chartered unto them. What would you think to be thus used? This is the stranger's case. And this your mountainish inhumanity. That's amazing. Thanks for talking to me, sir.

Bye-bye. bye bye was that astounding to hear Shakespeare how amazing was that to be spoken to in a in a Shakespearean monologue he was looking

right at me and I was looking right at him as he spoke those words and it was moving it and I let myself open to feel it and it did do exactly

what i needed to happen which was i understood every word of that and i felt it and i felt what he was saying he taught me a lesson in shakespeare among other things i found that to be a wonderful conversation and i do not use that word often i use other words that are like it it's not that i don't feel that often, but wonderful. I find it to be an awkward word. But I enjoy talking to him, and now I need to get into Shakespeare big time. Full on. Full on Shakespeare.

Go to WTFpod.com. There are no books left, but there's other things. If you're looking for mugs, you can go to BrianRJones.com. He might have a few. But he's a potter, and he has a child. There's only so much he can do to BrianRJones.com. He might have a few. But he's a potter and he has a child. There's only so much he can do. He'll make another batch eventually. But you can check that out.

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