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" I learned that coming out was crucial to self-esteem. "
Ian Mckellen
Coming
Learned
Self-Esteem
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" When I've been asked what should be on my gravestone, I've said: 'Here lies Gandalf. He came out.' Two big achievements. "
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Here
Big
Said
" In Singapore, Malcolm X type of activity would be extremely difficult because the government can be very harsh on lawbreakers. "
Ian Mckellen
Harsh
Singapore
Government
" If I was a star, it would be difficult to go off and do 'Coronation Street.' So I guess I'm not a star. "
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Difficult
Off
Guess
" Bolton School has a great tradition in the liberal arts. "
Ian Mckellen
School
Great
Arts
" I was brought up in industrial south Lancashire, down the cobbled road from where LS Lowry (1887 - 1976) lived and painted. "
Ian Mckellen
Down
Road
Up
" If I have any audience, they can know that anything I am in, I would go see, with the expectation of being really satisfied. "
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Audience
Expectation
I Am
" I love musicals; I love the ballet, opera, the circus. It's all performance to me. "
Ian Mckellen
Me
Performance
Ballet
" So it's joyful to me, in my 71st year, to be able to be in a play that is absolutely right for my age and my experience, and that is a popular success. What more could you ask as an actor? "
Ian Mckellen
You
Age
Me
" I can't take on all the worries of the world, you know. I can only talk about being gay and being an actor. I'll have to leave those other battles to somebody else. "
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Gay
I Can
Know
" Before I ever acted as an amateur - which I did a great deal at school and at university - I used to go to the theater with my parents in the north of England, where I was born and brought up... Theater of all sorts. "
Ian Mckellen
Born
Parents
Great
" I have little routines in the theater. Once I've established something, like the order of putting on makeup and a costume, I have to invariably do it in the same order every time, even if I only did it by chance the first time round. "
Ian Mckellen
Time
Chance
Makeup
" I think New York audiences are some of the brightest in the world, and certainly the most enthusiastic. "
Ian Mckellen
Most
New
New York
" I know actors who have had to turn down good roles because they just don't pay enough. It's hard. "
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Enough
Down
Know
" There are a lot of actors - I'm probably one - who are most at home when they're on stage. "
Ian Mckellen
Stage
Most
Lot
" Some relationships get easier as you get older, depending on what sort of person you are. I don't think I've got any better at them. "
Ian Mckellen
Older
Better
Relationships
" The huge difference in my lifetime is that you can just go up to somebody and make a pass. You couldn't do that in the 1950s if you were gay. There were secret handshakes, a secret language. There was nowhere you could go to be romantic outside of people's houses. "
Ian Mckellen
You
Language
Go
" I'm only an actor. I'm not a writer. I'm not going to leave any legacy. All I've ever done is learn the lines and say them. "
Ian Mckellen
Actor
Leave
Learn
" The strength of British theatre should be that these actors in their middle years know what they're doing and are good at it. Not rich, not famous, but making a living. "
Ian Mckellen
Strength
Theatre
Rich
" I'd never read 'Lord of the Rings' until I was asked to play Gandalf, so I didn't really know it was a frightfully famous book. "
Ian Mckellen
Famous
Book
Never
" There is a fantasy as old as the modern gay rights movement that if all our skins turned lavender overnight, the majority, confounded by our numbers and our diversity, and recognising a few of our faces, would at once let go of prejudice forevermore. "
Ian Mckellen
Prejudice
Old
Numbers
" One school invited me down, as two pupils had come out, and the headmaster didn't know what to do about it. I said, 'How many students here are gay?' and he said, 'Just these two.' Clearly not. 'How many gay members of staff have you got?' He had no idea. And this was a concerned man. "
Ian Mckellen
Gay
School
Man
" Every anti-gay remark from the Church gives the thug a license to be cruel. "
Ian Mckellen
Church
License
Thug
" There are people who've enjoyed my work in the theater, and they let me know that it was special for them. I'm not going to say, 'Well, you should have seen me as Gandalf!' "
Ian Mckellen
Special
Work
Know
" I used to comfort myself when I became an actor that it was a useful job, entertaining people. And it was important to do it as well as you possibly can. "
Ian Mckellen
Actor
You
People
" 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. "
Ian Mckellen
People
Happy
Love
" The press like to talk to actors. They mustn't be surprised when actors talk back to them. "
Ian Mckellen
Press
Them
Back
" I'm the sort of person who doesn't write in ink. I only write in pencil, so it can be rubbed out. "
Ian Mckellen
Ink
Only
Out
" Godot is whatever it is in life that you are waiting for: 'I'm waiting to win the lottery. I'm waiting to fall in love'. For me, as a child, it was Christmas. At least that eventually came. "
Ian Mckellen
Win
Fall
Life
" Anyone in public life who comes out, comes out primarily for themselves, and their life is immediately improved. That's what happened to me. "
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Who
Me
Happened
" Imagine trying to be a gay actor, a gay anything in modern Russia? Where to be positively oneself, to be affectionate in public with someone you love of the same gender, or to talk of that love in the hearing of anyone under 18, will put you prison? "
Ian Mckellen
Gender
Prison
Trying