Who Does Ian McKellen Think He Are?

March 23, 2024 2:45 PM

As the 'last of the McKellens', Sir Ian admits to a degree of melancholy as he delves into his family history [1h]. But the results pay off richly for one of Britain's greatest actors and civil rights champions. Ian's journey uncovers a theatrical ancestor, a Victorian political activist and a link to an ancient druidical landmark in the Lake District.

I've watched quite a few episodes of this show, but this one feels particularly poignant and worth sharing. I'm not entirely sure why, but this is the first time I've wanted to be all "Oh Oh Oh, Watch this one!" about this show.

posted by hippybear (11 comments total)

Partly just because he’s such a great guy, in all kinds of ways?
posted by Phanx at 3:41 PM on March 23

Oh, this sounds great! Thank you for the encouragement to watch this one, hippybear!
posted by kristi at 4:24 PM on March 23

Video unavailable
The uploader has not made this video available in your country
posted by thecjm at 5:50 PM on March 23

Geo-locked to me too. I think someone mentioned in MetaTalk there is a tool to check that. I do remember this episode, though, and it was good. It's not currently on iPlayer either. There's an article about it here, for anyone who can't watch it but would like to read about it.

Charles Dance is another good actor episode (iPlayer link).
posted by paduasoy at 7:10 PM on March 23 [2 favorites]

Thanks for the article! Fascinating to read these old newspaper clippings. That first review is quite something, so odd to read Ian McKellan and Judi Dench without ‘Sir’ and ‘Dame’ preceding their names, but I imagine that was quite the production with such leading talent!
posted by TwoWordReview at 12:53 AM on March 24

Video unavailable. Yup, but about half the episode is available [to me?] in 3-8min chunks. Which is possibly enough.
WDYTYA works because of the editing. I doubt any of the projects starts and gets dumped out because the principal's entire ancestry is dull dull dull.
posted by BobTheScientist at 2:39 AM on March 24

The Patrick Stewart one is also moving, especially the exploration of his father's war experience and how it informed his later behavior.
posted by Wretch729 at 4:40 AM on March 24 [2 favorites]

WDYTYA works because of the editing. I doubt any of the projects starts and gets dumped out because the principal's entire ancestry is dull dull dull.

Interestingly (or dully?) Michael Parkinson claimed that his ancestry was too dull to film.

I love the way the producers use the program the way you'd want to: illuminate the history of people that folks don't often think about. Particularly important that they don't shy away from the impact of colonialism and the British empire on the lives of people. Stories not told as much in British society as they should be! Some great examples, if you have access to these ones in your bit of the world: Adil Ray, Naomie Harris, Dev Griffin and the van Tulleken's as recent examples.
posted by sarcas at 7:10 AM on March 24

Particularly important that they don't shy away from the impact of colonialism and the British empire on the lives of people.

Also that a lot of people who think of themselves as completely British turn out to have ancestors who were immigrants and/or refugees.

I've become oddly obsessed with this program, particularly the British version, because I don't think the US version is as interesting. (That may just be because I know more about US history.) I'm sort of fascinated by how many people have ancestors who were involved in violent agrarian labor protests, for instance. I absolutely know that existed, because I've read about it in history books, but I guess I didn't put together that it follows that random working-class British people would turn out to have ancestors who were involved in the Swing riots.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 8:58 AM on March 24 [1 favorite]

Another one I found really interesting was Jason Donovan - most of it is on YouTube.
posted by goo at 5:21 PM on March 24

Two more episodes to track down - at least parts of them, if you can - are the episodes about David Tennant and Alex Kingston.

* David Tennant's maternal grandfather was a football star and went over to play for Derry for a while; he apparently did very well for himself there, and won the heart of a local lass, married her and brought her back to Scotland. This meant, though, that his great-great-granddad was part of the Orange Order - something he didn't find out until he was sitting in the parlor of some just-met-for-the-first-time second cousins, and one of them brings out great-granddad's Orange Order sash to give to him. He covered it well, but then they show a clip of him walking around outside a bit after the meeting, holding the sash in his hands and looking extremely uncomfortable.

* Alex Kingston traced her ancestry back to a woman who seemed to be doing quite well for herself, even though she lived alone; she even had a fairly big house somewhere in London, at a time when women didn't often own property. .....That's because the house was a brothel, and her ancestor was the Madam.

Watching a very prim and timid-looking genealogist try to explain that to a clueless Alex Kingston by dropping bigger and bigger hints until she finally got it was one of the funnier things I've seen.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 2:06 PM on March 25