Ian McKellen
Jonathan Bate weaves a memoir around madness in English literature
There is a trend for books in which academics write personally about their engagement with literature. Examples include Lara Feigel’s…
Somewhere in this production lies Shakespeare's tragedy: Almeida's Macbeth reviewed
Yaël Farber’s Macbeth sets out to be a great work of art. The director crams the Almeida’s stage with suggestive…
Ian McKellen is riveting: Hamlet, at Theatre Royal Windsor, reviewed
Ian McKellen in his early eighties plays the Dane in his mid-twenties. A production with such a strange innovation should…
It’s not all fluffed lines: the serious business of amateur dramatics
The greatest pain of lockdown has been, for me, the absence of am-dram. In one half of my life I’m…
If we offer Ian McKellan a peerage, will he promise not to inflict his King Lear on us again?
Gandalf, also known as Ian McKellen, has awarded himself another lap of honour by bringing King Lear back to London.…
Paradise Lost is made for radio – but you need to concentrate
It’s a tough listen, Paradise Lost on Radio 4 at the weekend. In bold defiance of the demands of a…
National Poetry Day's mistake: letting normal people do the reading
Imagine what Brennig Davies must have felt like just before 11 o’clock last Tuesday evening. The 15-year-old was about to…
I dozed through it quite significantly: Mr Holmes reviewed
Mr Holmes stars Ian McKellen as the great detective in his old age and while it could have proved a…
