Sir Ian McKellen has revealed that a fat suit “saved” his “ribs and other joints” during a fall from a stage in the West End. The veteran screen and stage actor, 85, lost his footing during a Player Kings fight scene in June when the production was at the Noel Coward Theatre and has since been suffering from wrist and neck injuries. Speaking to Saga magazine, The Bolton School old boy said: “I’ve relived that fall I don’t know how many times.
It was horrible. READ MORE: Showtime for legendary actor Sir Ian McKellen who celebrated his birthday on stage at the Albert Halls “It was in the battle scene. My foot got caught in a chair, and trying to shake it off I started to slide on some newspaper that was scattered over the stage, like I was on a skateboard.
“The more I tried to get rid of it, the faster I proceeded down a step, onto the forestage, and then on to the lap of someone in the front row. “I started screaming, ‘Help me!’ and then ‘I’m sorry! I don’t do this!’. Extraordinary things.
I thought it was the end of something. It was very upsetting.” “The end”, he clarifies, did not mean “my death.
It was my participation in the play. I have to keep assuring myself that I’m not too old to act and it was just a bloody accident. “I didn’t lose consciousness, I hadn’t been dizzy, but I’ve not been able to go back and they still played without me.
“I don’t feel guilty, but the accident has let down the whole production,” he .