As actor Ian McKellen looks back on some of his most iconic roles, he wonders if some actors who were offered the part of Gandalf in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings Trilogy didn't regret turning the role down.
Speaking with Variety, the veteran performer was asked whether he ever felt bad when he wasn't a casting director's first choice for a specific character. "I don’t think you’re ever the first choice," McKellen said. "I certainly wasn’t the first choice for Gandalf. Tony Hopkins turned it down. Sean Connery certainly did. They’re all coming out of the woodwork now, and I hope they feel silly."
McKellen famously portrayed Gandalf the Grey in The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of The King before stepping away from the role for a few years and ultimately returning to play the wizard in The Hobbit Trilogy. While many devotees of Tolkien's work have acknowledged that the actor's version of Gandalf differs from how he's represented in the books, he has still earned plenty of praise for his imposing yet caring performance.
A New Gandalf
While McKellen may not play Gandalf again in the future, the character lives on in Prime Video's The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. Set a thousand years before the events covered in Jackson's films, the show depicts a younger version of the magician who is played by Daniel Weyman. Having mysteriously dropped from the heavens already equipped with a bushy beard, many fans suspected this so-called Stranger to be Gandalf but it took until the Season 1 finale for that to be confirmed.
Aside from The Lord of the Rings, McKellen has made himself known in various other fandom circles, most especially for his role as Magneto in Fox's X-Men franchise. He almost joined the world of Harry Potter as Dumbledore following the death of Richard Harris but he ultimately turned down the part because it didn't feel right to him. "When they called me up and said would I be interested in being in the Harry Potter films, they didn't say in what part," McKellen said. "I worked out what they were thinking, and I couldn't...take over the part from an actor who I'd known didn't approve of me."
Jackson's Lord of the Rings movies are available to stream on Max.
Source: Variety