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

Acting is a very personal process. It has to do with expressing your own personality, and discovering the character you're playing through your own experience - so we're all different.

My acting stopped being about disguise and became about truth which suits the camera, so my film career took off when I came out.

Elijah looks angelic but his beauty of spirit is what makes his Frodo leap out of the screen. Unalloyed goodness is one of the most difficult attributes to act.

I was brought up in industrial south Lancashire, down the cobbled road from where LS Lowry (1887-1976) lived and painted.

Acting is no longer about lying. It's now about revealing the truth. People are at ease with me now. Honesty is the best policy.

Macbeth is a very popular play with audiences. If you want to sell out a theater, just mount a production of Macbeth. It's a short play, it's an exciting play, it's easy to understand, and it attracts great acting.