“What Sir Ian, Miriam, Richard and the Flight of the Conchords’ Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement have done has been overwhelming. The last two months touring with Ian McKellen on Stage and seeing the outpouring of support from people around New Zealand has just been incredible.”

Ian McKellen says that he’s thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to create a special show and perform it around the country, opening in “Stratford on Patea” and taking it to audiences in small and large theatres from Auckland to Wanaka, Palmerston North, Tauranga and even Carterton.

Highlights of the tour included the opening performance in Stratford’s King’s Theatre with Mastermind winner and Shakespeare expert Ida Gaskin in the audience, being challenged by a seven-year-old wielding Gandalf’s sword in Palmerston North; catching up with Lady June Hillary at the show in Auckland; discovering a long lost cousin in Hawke’s Bay and having a special ring made by the makers of the ‘One Ring’ in Nelson.

The tour finished last weekend with the penultimate sold out show at Wellington’s Opera House with cast members from The Hobbit including Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Billy Connolly, James Nesbitt and Aidan Turner in the audience and later joining Sir Ian on stage for the encore and helping gather more than $10,000 in public donations from the collection buckets alone.

All the venues on the tour sold quickly meaning that many people missed the opportunity to see a show that will never be staged anywhere else in the world. A Trade Me page will be launched this week to offer the final few hundred show programmes signed by Ian McKellen so that those who missed out can still own something unique to New Zealand and still donate to the fundraising cause.

In a recent Wall Street Journal interview, Sir Ian commented: “It is a show absolutely for New Zealand. It is absolutely for Christchurch and for the people who wanted to come along. I like that. I think people have sensed that this is really for us. For me, it’s been a very, very merry thing to do.”

Mr Cox said Sir Ian’s contribution will never be forgotten in Christchurch and in special recognition of his overwhelming generosity, one of the Royal boxes at the restored Isaac Theatre Royal, known as “The Bard’s Box” for its bust of William Shakespeare, will become the Ian McKellen Royal Suite.

“It’s been a very special two months. The theatre is one of the few historic buildings in Christchurch to survive the earthquakes and it is wonderful to know it can be rebuilt and serve as a beacon for Canterbury people. To Ian, Richard, Jemaine, Bret and Miriam, our heartfelt thanks and appreciation.”

Work to rebuild the Isaac Theatre Royal began at 6am on Monday 2 July when contractors Naylor Love will lower the historic ceiling dome into the stripped-out auditorium to signal the start of a repair and enhancement project that will span 18 months and cost in excess of $28million, funded largely by insurance with fundraising continuing to raise the remainder of the $6million shortfall.

The original and spectacular ceiling dome is famous for its Italianate painting of scenes from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and was painted by G.C. Post of the Carrara Ceiling Company of Wellington.

It has been a unique highlight of the Theatre Royal's interior since it opened in February 1908. The theatre, with its elaborate fibrous plaster decoration of walls and painted dome, was considered at the time one of the best of its type in the southern hemisphere.

Mr Cox said the full repair programme will see the theatre open in a ‘transitional’ format in July 2013 for three months before closing again completely between October 2013 and April 2014 “when ‘the Grand Old Lady’ will finally reopen again in her full restored and upgraded glory”.

ENDS

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