Sir Ian McKellen turned down $1.5m to officiate wedding as Gandalf
Ian McKellen fears the return of Section 28 in the UK. (Getty Images)
Sir Ian McKellen has done what we’d never have the strength to do and turned down $1.5m to officiate Sean Parker’s wedding dressed as Gandalf.
Asked to officiate the tech billionaire’s wedding, the actor told him: “I am sorry, Gandalf doesn’t do weddings” and “I don’t go dressing up, except in plays and things.”
Sean Parker is a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who founded Napster and served as the first ever president of Facebook.
He was portrayed in the film Social Network, about the founding of Facebook, by singer Justin Timberlake.
Parker’s Lord of the Rings-themed wedding took place in 2013, in California – but Sir Ian only revealed his role this week.
He told the Mail on Sunday: “‘I was offered one-and- a-half million dollars to marry a very famous couple in California, which I would perhaps have considered doing but I had to go dressed as Gandalf.”
The lavish ceremony, with fur-covered tables and genuine costumes, cost Parker $10m. He married singer Alexandra Lenas.
The centerpiece for the whole thing, however, was out of his price range.
Sir Ian qualified as a celebrant in 2013 in order to officiate the wedding of best friend Patrick Stewart and his wife, Sunny Ozeil.
While the actor might not be Gandalf for private hire, he is always happy to be Gandalf for LGBT equality, free of charge
The star frequently steps into his old role to thrill schoolkids on his LGBT anti-bullying visits with Stonewall.
McKellen helped to found Stonewall in 1989.
Related: Ian McKellen nearly cried on stage reading a beautiful coming out letter
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