Mckellen’s theatrical marathon is a wizard idea
Ian Mckellen on Stage Above the Stag, Vauxhall ★★★★★
Sir Ian Mckellen, the greatest male Shakespearean actor of his generation and late-starting Hollywood star known to millions as Gandalf (or Magneto), is on the road. Sir Ian (he prefers the down-to-earth “Ian”) has had the wizard, if potentially exhausting, idea of visiting 80 venues across the land to mark his 80th birthday on May 25.
At each date of this unique audience with acting royalty, presented thanks to the Ambassador Theatre Group and directed by Sean Mathias, the proceeds will go to helping that theatre, great or small.
Reminiscing about his life, reciting poetry and conducting a Shakespearean masterclass that stands comparison with his muchloved 1987 West End homage to the Bard is commitment enough. But he even rattles a fundraising bucket at the door afterwards.
This week, Mckellen in his anecdotage gets a standing ovation at his sixth port of call: Above the Stag – under Vauxhall railway arches, trains rumbling overhead. There’s huge fondness for him at this LGBT+ venue, given his role in championing gay rights (he came out in 1988). Yet what’s striking about the show, first seen on the fringe in 2017, is that it situates passing, poignant reflections on his sexuality (and the repressive climate gay men habitually encountered in less tolerant times) within the context of his devotion to acting.
The undimmed ardency of his passion for the arts in general, and theatre in particular, illuminates the evening. In the sort of clothing, natty-meets-hippy-ish, that suggests a characterful Camden Market stalltrader, with Gandalf ’s pointy hat a briefly added extra feature, he rummages for props in a cardboard trunk (the sides of which get slapped with a souvenir sticker at every stop-off) and begins by unpacking the origins of his devotion.
Growing up in Wigan, he was taken to Peter Pan in Manchester as a nipper. He spotted the wires – “I was a very critical three-year-old” – but was smitten by the mechanics.
“I want more of this, I’m coming back,” he recalls thinking. An early diary entry read: “Anything to do with the theatre pleases me.”
That childhood infatuation is there with him to this hour – often counteracting the inevitable wistfulness of heading down memory lane by putting a spring in his step, whether that be in giving us a taste of Gus The Theatre Cat (his contribution to the forthcoming film version of the Cats musical) or an impish reprise of his Old Vic Widow Twankey, all puckered lips and saucy eye-rolls. The rejuvenating quality of performances retained in his muscle-memory is particularly apparent as he lugs out the Complete Works of Shakespeare and gets the audience to pick a passage at random.
Some of the plays get short shrift and a gossipy aside. But the ghosts of triumphs past are fleshed out afresh as he loud-whispers Henry V’s rallying-cry at Harfleur, say, or cups a palm to his face as the lovestruck Romeo. Even his contemplation of death as aged Justice Shallow in
Henry IV Part II so exemplifies his vocal and facial expressiveness that it gives you something to cheer even as it clobbers you with melancholy.
At the start of the evening, I worried that Mckellen – a little out of breath and stumbling a tad through a reading from The Lord of the Rings
– might be attempting too much. But emerging from his marathon unbowed, he signs off with a rendition of Sir Thomas More’s rebuke of English xenophobia so faultless it’s as if he has narrowed the gap of time between our own age and Shakespeare’s – and turned his own body-clock back too. Come one, come all – and marvel.
Touring until Sept 15. Tickets: ianonstage.co.uk