Alec Guinness Urged Ian McKellen to Stay Out of Gay Rights — Despite Having a Hidden Truth of His Own
When Sir Ian McKellen steps into a room, he carries decades of theatrical history with him, and the stories that come with that history rarely disappoint. The 86-year-old stage and screen legend, celebrated for his defining turns as Gandalf in ‘The Lord of the Rings‘ and Magneto in the ‘X-Men‘ franchise, has never shied away from candor. McKellen publicly came out as gay in 1988 and went on to co-found the LGBTQ+ lobby group Stonewall the following year, cementing his place as one of the most visible and outspoken LGBTQ+ advocates in the entertainment world.
That legacy of activism, it turns out, was forged partly in defiance of advice from a most unexpected source. McKellen recalled that in 1979, while performing in Martin Sherman’s groundbreaking play ‘Bent,’ highlighting the persecution of gay men in Nazi labour camps, Sir Alec Guinness came backstage to his dressing room, quietly offering compliments and an invitation to supper, which McKellen declined. A second meeting, years later, would prove far more consequential.
In a recent interview with The Guardian, McKellen described being taken to lunch by Guinness at an Italian restaurant in Pimlico, where the older actor made his true intentions clear. Guinness had learned of McKellen’s work establishing Stonewall and expressed his discomfort directly, telling McKellen he considered it unseemly for an actor to engage in public or political matters, and effectively pleaded with him to step back. McKellen, characteristically, did not.
The exchange carries an additional, complicated layer given what history has since revealed about Guinness himself. Two biographies published in 2001 disclosed that Guinness, who remained married to actress and playwright Merula Silvia Salaman from 1938 until his death in 2000, was privately bisexual, a fact known only to those closest to him. One authorised biography claimed Guinness was charged with a homosexual act in a public lavatory in 1946, an incident he concealed by giving his name as Herbert Pocket, the character he was playing that year in ‘Great Expectations.’
The memory of that Pimlico lunch resurfaced for McKellen while watching ‘Two Halves of Guinness,’ a touring solo show in which actor Zeb Soanes explores episodes from Guinness’s life, including allusions to his latent bisexuality. McKellen noted the material would likely have disturbed Guinness greatly. The irony is difficult to miss: the man who urged a fellow actor to stay silent on gay rights was himself quietly navigating a hidden part of his own identity.
McKellen has spoken openly in the past about regretting not coming out sooner, saying in 2015 that he would have been a different and happier person had he done so before 1988, and emphasizing that self-confidence is the most important quality anyone can possess. That honesty, which Guinness once tried to discourage, has since become central to how the world understands McKellen’s extraordinary career.
The actor is currently promoting ‘The Christophers,’ a new art forgery drama co-starring Michaela Coel, and is set to return to Middle-earth to reprise his role as Gandalf in the forthcoming ‘The Hunt for Gollum.’ With a career still very much in motion, McKellen’s willingness to share stories like this one feels less like nostalgia and more like a continuing act of the same defiance.
Whether you think actors should keep politics personal or lead from the front, what do you make of the complicated truth this story reveals about Guinness, and the choice McKellen made to ignore his advice?
