One of my favorite all-time actors is Sir Ian McKellen. I love him as Magneto (X-Men), as Gandalf
(LOTR/The Hobbit), as Leigh Tebing (the DiVinci Code) and pretty much anything else I've ever seen him in. I really wish I had money
to head to New York City and see him in the plays he is doing right now (with Sir Patrick Stewart, another of my favorite men), Waiting for Godot and No Man's Land. Maybe he will do something in Los
Angeles again and I can get down for it. Right. If wishes were horses, we would all ride like kings.
I guess I will have to be content with having spoken to him once.
I worked on the season of the previous “ellen” show (with
Ellen DeGeneres) during the year that she (and her character) “came out”, in
1998. It was a wonderful time and a great experience. One of my jobs as the Set Production
Assistant was to babysit the stage phone, and at lunch one day, I received a call from a
gentleman who identified himself as Ian McKellen. It was not an altogether uncommon occurrence to receive
phone calls from “close personal friends of Ellen” on the set from overzealous fans…
but, there was that British accent that gave me pause. I found Ellen smoking
out on the patio and told her who was on the phone. Her response surprised me. She leaped to her feet and said, “Oh my god,
really? Do you know who that IS?” I replied no.
She rolled her eyes, grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and
dragged me behind her to the set phone and ordered me to stand there
quietly. She hastily picked up the phone. I could, of course, only hear Ellen’s end of
the conversation, but I was surprised to listen to her say “yes, sir” and “thank you, sir”
and “of course, sir”. Who on EARTH was
Ellen yes-sir-ing?
She hung up the phone and her happy, silly grin turned to a
frown as she turned to me. “Kerry, you are the worst lesbian
EVER*, “she said. “Go find out who Ian
McKellen is, please.”
I did. I named my son Ian after him.
Thank you, Sir Ian, for all who you are and have done! If I had a hat worth tipping, I would tip it
for you.
http://www.mckellen.com/activism/ Check out Sir Ian’s website, it has all
kinds of interesting information!
(*I identified as lesbian back then for lack of a better label;
now I identify as pansexual. I guess
Ellen was right after all – I *was* a rotten lesbian because of the men, but I obviously
was not straight because of the women, LOL… ah, well. Glad I got that “ figured out finally, better late than never. And yes, one of my claims to fame is that the QBIC - Queen Bitch In Charge - called me the worse lesbian ever, LOL, gotta love that).
((P.S. I am having problems inserting photographs onto my blog for some reason, so while I figure this out with much cussing and hair pulling, we won't have pretty pictures to look at. Bummer, I know.))
((P.S. I am having problems inserting photographs onto my blog for some reason, so while I figure this out with much cussing and hair pulling, we won't have pretty pictures to look at. Bummer, I know.))
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