
Acting
Born May 25, 1939 · Burnley, Lancashire, England, UK
Sir Ian Murray McKellen (born 25 May 1939) is an English actor. He has played roles on the screen and stage in genres ranging from Shakespearean dramas and modern theatre to popular fantasy and science fiction. He is regarded as a British cultural icon and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1991. He has received numerous accolades, including a Tony Award, six Olivier Awards, and a Golden Globe Award, as well as nominations for two Academy Awards, five BAFTA Awards and five Emmy Awards. McKellen made his stage debut in 1961 at the Belgrade Theatre as a member of its repertory company, and in 1965 made his first West End appearance. In 1969, he was invited to join the Prospect Theatre Company to play the lead parts in Shakespeare's Richard II and Marlowe's Edward II. In the 1970s, McKellen became a stalwart of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre of Great Britain. He has earned five Olivier Awards for his roles in Pillars of the Community (1977), The Alchemist (1978), Bent (1979), Wild Honey (1984), and Richard III (1995). McKellen made his Broadway debut in The Promise (1965). He received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his role as Antonio Salieri in Amadeus (1980). He was further nominated for Ian McKellen: Acting Shakespeare (1984). He returned to Broadway in Wild Honey(1986), Dance of Death (1990), No Man's Land (2013), and Waiting for Godot (2013), the latter two being a joint production with Patrick Stewart. McKellen achieved worldwide fame for his film roles, including the titular King in Richard III(1995), James Whale in Gods and Monsters (1998), Magneto in the X-Men films, Cogsworth in Beauty and the Beast (2017) and Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings (2001–2003) and The Hobbit (2012–2014) trilogies. Other notable film roles include A Touch of Love (1969), Plenty (1985), Six Degrees of Separation (1993), Restoration (1995), Flushed Away (2006), Mr. Holmes (2015), and The Good Liar (2019). McKellen came out as gay in 1988, and has since championed LGBT social movements worldwide. He was awarded the Freedom of the City of London in October 2014. McKellen is a cofounder of Stonewall, an LGBT rights lobby group in the United Kingdom, named after the Stonewall riots. He is also patron of LGBT History Month, Pride London, Oxford Pride, GayGlos, LGBT Foundation and FFLAG. Description above from the Wikipedia article Ian McKellen, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum
2027

Avengers: Doomsday
2026
Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol
2026

The Christophers
2026

LS Lowry: The Unheard Tapes
2026

Schadenfreude
2025

A World War II Fairy Tale: The Making of Michael Mann's 'The Keep'
2025
Dragged Through Time
2025

Ken Dodd: A Legacy of Happiness
2025

The Critic
2024

Dragfox
2024

The Real Ken Dodd: The Man I Loved
2024

The Life and Death of Lily Savage
2024

Hamlet
2024

The One Note Man
2023

Quintessentially British
2022

Freedom: 50 Years of Pride
2022

Hamlet Within
2022

Hating Peter Tatchell
2021

Infinitum: Subject Unknown
2021

Ian McKellen on Stage: With Tolkien, Shakespeare, Others and YOU
2020

Du Fu: China's Greatest Poet
2020

Cats
2019

The Good Liar
2019

On Broadway
2019

All Is True
2018

National Theatre Live: King Lear
2018

Animal Crackers
2018