Ian Mckellen Quotes

On this page you can find the TOP of Ian Mckellen's best quotes! We hope you will find some sayings from Actor Ian Mckellen's in our collection, which will inspire you to new achievements! There are currently 85 quotes on this page collected since May 25, 1939! Share our collection of quotes with your friends on social media so that they can find something to inspire them!
All quotes by Ian Mckellen: Acting Character Film Lying School Theatre more...
  • There are directors, and I think this is true of all directors, it would be true if I was a director - If the actor didn't want to do what I was suggesting, I would let him do it his way, and then I would say to him, "Just give me one where you do what the director wants", and that, of course, is the take that's used.

    Source: collider.com
  • Personally, coming out was one of the most important things I've ever done, lifting from my shoulders the millstone of lies that I hadn't even realized I was carrying.

  • It may be my rather puritanical upbringing at odds with my inborn laziness that makes me feel guilty at the end of the day, unless I am able to point at some achievement. But this need be no more impressive than cooking a meal or going for a long walk.

    "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.
  • Every anti-gay remark from the Church gives the thug a license to be cruel.

  • Acting is no longer about lying. It's now about revealing the truth. People are at ease with me now. Honesty is the best policy.

    "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.
  • I think I'm a bit gruffer than I used to be, and I'm certainly older.

    Source: collider.com
  • It is so painful watching yourself act, particularly because you can't do anything about it, it's all done and dusted.

    Source: collider.com
  • I think it's one thing to declare your sexuality, if you care about what that is. It's another thing to start talking in public about what you do in private and who you do it with. It's not that they [my significant others] don't want to be identified as gay, but that they don't want to be identified as ... with me.

    "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.
  • It was wrongly assumed that I wished to become some sort of leader among gay activists, whereas in reality I was happier to be a foot soldier.

  • Splendid architecture, the love of your life, an old friend... they can all go drifting by unseen if youre not careful.

    "Ian McKellen: 'I couldn't be a dad, I'm too selfish'". Mirror.co.uk Interview, www.mirror.co.uk. April 11, 2010.
  • No one needs to feel sorry for me or anyone else who has fallen victim to success.

  • The demographic of our audience is young. It also contains a high proportion of black, Jewish and gay people, who have all been encouraged by society to think of themselves as oddities or mutants. I hope that's why X-Men chimes with them - it's certainly why I was attracted to the idea in the first place.

    Source: www.indielondon.co.uk
  • I don't make much distinction between being a stand-up comic and acting Shakespeare - in fact, unless you're a good comedian, you're never going to be able to play Hamlet properly.

    "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.
  • Before acting, I wanted to become a journalist. I also toyed with the idea of being a chef - but that's only when people asked me what I wanted to be. In fact, I always used to say I wanted to be an actor, but I didn't ever believe that I was good enough to be come one.

    "Interview with Sir Ian McKellen (Part 1 of 4)". Interview with BY Kenneth Plume, www.ign.com. July 10, 2000.
  • In the theatre, the actor is in total control. The director wasn't in the house last night, the designer wasn't there, the author's dead. It's just us and the audience.

  • Elijah looks angelic but his beauty of spirit is what makes his Frodo leap out of the screen. Unalloyed goodness is one of the most difficult attributes to act.

  • Journalists often ask me: "Aren't you sorry that after all the work you've done, you're best known as Magneto and Gandalf?" But that's what I've always wanted - not to be known as myself. I want to draw attention to the characters.

    Source: www.indielondon.co.uk
  • Why live outside the US? Do you want health care or safe food products or democracy or something? They're all overrated. Stay for the excellent cable TV.

  • On the day after 9/11, I walking through the smoke and the smells of New York. There were knots of policemen everywhere. As I went past one officer, he called out: "Hi, Magneto." That's an indication of X-Men's extraordinary reach.

    Source: www.indielondon.co.uk
  • If I was on a march at the moment I would be saying to everyone: Be honest with each other. Admit there are limitless possibilities in relationships, and love as many people as you can in whatever way you want, and get rid of your inhibitions, and we'll all be happy.

  • You would be surprised how many directors don't know what they want. They might not know what they want until they see it, they might know what they want but no idea how to get it out of the actor, then you've both got a problem.

    Source: collider.com
  • I am going around British secondary schools, as a gay man talking about my life, and encouraging schools to get rid of homophobic bullying and to care for their gay members of staff and their gay students.

    Source: www.broadwayworld.com
  • I’ve often thought the Bible should have a disclaimer in the front saying this is fiction.

    "Church Groups Ramp Up Anti-'Da Vinci' Campaigns" by Jake Tapper and Toni Wilson, abcnews.go.com. May 17, 2006.
  • The thing you notice here after America is how refreshingly ordinary people look, because they haven't had their chin wrapped around the back of their ears.

  • I've had enough of being a gay icon! I've had enough of all this hard work, because, since I came out, I keep getting all these parts, and my career's taken off. I want a quiet life. I'm going back into the closet. But I can't get back into the closet, because it's absolutely jam-packed full of other actors.

    Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.
  • Baz [Luhrmann] paid me one of the greatest compliments ever. I don't know him, really, but when I first met him I was congratulating him on ROMEO + JULIET - which I think is a wonderful adaptation - and he said, "Oh, well we couldn't have done it without your RICHARD III, which was an inspiration!" I've never quite checked up on the dates to see whether or if, in fact, we did our film before he did his.

    Source: www.broadwayworld.com
  • [There's] nothing special about an actor's imagination, except that he uses it a lot.

    Source: www.npr.org
  • In the old-fashioned sitcoms, to be gay was, in itself, funny, and you laughed at the characters rather than with them.

    Source: collider.com
  • You can always pick out stage actors at the Oscars: they know how to walk.

    2002 In the Observer,17 Feb.
  • If you're sounding right, you're probably walking right, and vice versa. If you get the footwork right - if you get even one line right in a rehearsal, the director will say, do you know when you said that, it was exactly the character. You were - really landed on it.

    "At 76, Actor Ian McKellen Embodies An Older Sherlock In 'Mr. Holmes'". "Fresh Air" with Dave Davies, www.npr.org. July 20, 2015.
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  • We hope you have found the saying you were looking for in our collection! At the moment, we have collected 85 quotes from the Actor Ian Mckellen, starting from May 25, 1939! We periodically replenish our collection so that visitors of our website can always find inspirational quotes by authors from all over the world! Come back to us again!
    Ian Mckellen quotes about: Acting Character Film Lying School Theatre