The audience's expectations are ever-present.

I think it's one thing to declare your sexuality, if you care about what that is. It's another thing to start talking in public about what you do in private and who you do it with. It's not that they [my significant others] don't want to be identified as gay, but that they don't want to be identified as ... with me.

I often thought my gravestone would say, 'Here lies Gandalf. He came out,'

When you were on stage, you could be absolutely open about your emotions and indulge them and express yourself in a way that - in real life - I wasn't doing.

When you're on stage with an audience, the director's nowhere to be seen. He's onto the next job.

Splendid architecture, the love of your life, an old friend... they can all go drifting by unseen if youre not careful.

I headed out to have a breather at the stage door, dressed in my tramp costume. I had my bowler hat between my feet and there were passers-by, and one of them turned back and said, 'Do you need help, brother?' And $1 fell into my hat!