Mission: Impossible II Originally Wanted Sir Ian McKellen In Anthony Hopkins' IMF Boss Role
"Mission: Impossible II" is the most James Bond-flavored of the film series. John Woo's action is characteristically explosive, especially compared to Brian De Palma's lighter touch in the first film and the later movies' emphasis on death-defying stunts.
It's the only film so far where Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) isn't framed for treason or disavowed by the Impossible Mission Force (IMF). No, foiling the terrorist theft of a bio-weapon is just a day at the office for him, the way it is for Bond. Ethan even has a girl of the week, Nyah Nordoff-Hall (Thandiwe Newton).
Sir Anthony Hopkins also makes an uncredited appearance as Commander Swanbeck, who is M in all but name. Like the MI6 director in "Bond," Swanbeck is the old British man who gives our hero his mission. Originally, Woo and his crew had a different knighted British thespian in mind for the part: Sir Ian McKellen.
Why Sir Ian said no
Speaking to People in 2015, McKellen revealed he was offered the part of Swanbeck, but turned it down since he was only permitted to read his own scenes. If you've seen "Mission: Impossible II," you'll know Swanbeck is barely in the finished movie: he only shows up to give Ethan his mission, and then again at the end to congratulate him on a job well done. It's possible that he had more scenes that were cut, but McKellen still felt like he couldn't even get a glimpse at the picture with what he was given. He explained:
"I couldn't judge from reading just those scenes what the script was like. So I said no. And my agent said, 'You can't say no to working with Tom Cruise!' and I said, 'I think I will.'"
According to McKellen, the very next day afterward, he got the offer to play Magneto in "X-Men" and then, soon after that, Gandalf in "The Lord of the Rings." McKellen says that if he accepted "Mission: Impossible," he would've missed out on both these roles. "'Mission: Impossible' was put off, put off, put off," the actor explained. "And if I had decided to do that, I wouldn't have been in 'X-Men' and I wouldn't have been in 'Lord of the Rings.'"
He adds that "X-Men" almost interfered with "The Lord of the Rings" — had Peter Jackson not accommodated his schedule and the since-disgraced Bryan Singer not sped up the "X-Men" shoot, McKellen might not have played Gandalf. Let's take a deeper look, though — would Swanbeck have precluded McKellen from playing Magneto and Gandalf?
Conflicting schedules
"Mission: Impossible II" was shot from April 18, 1999, to December 15, 1999, primarily between New South Wales, Australia, and Los Angeles. "X-Men" was filmed was shot between September 22, 1999, to March 3, 2000, in Ontario then "The Lord of the Rings" (the whole trilogy was one production) was filmed in New Zealand from October 1999 to December 2000. So, these shoots did overlap and if you compare the exact dates, you can see how "X-Men" almost tanked McKellen's commitment to "The Lord of the Rings." McKellen also would've had to go back and forth across the Pacific to partake in all three shoots.
There's another piece of casting trivia reveals just how close McKellen was cutting it. Dougray Scott, who plays the main villain of "MI2," was originally set to play Wolverine. However, he had to drop out of "X-Men" due to scheduling conflicts, paving the way for Hugh Jackman to take the part instead.
The one thing that gives me pause is how small Swanbeck's role in "MI2" is. In 2015, McKellen and Hopkins (they starred together in "The Dresser" that year) sat down for a dual interview with Empire editor Nick de Semlyen, where they were asked about "Mission: Impossible II." McKellen maintains playing Swanbeck would've kept him out of "X-Men" and "The Lord of the Rings." However, Hopkins (who called McKellen passing on "MI2" a "good move") revealed that, unsurprisingly, he was only on the "MI2" set for a few days — even when the crew had to reshoot some out-of-focus shots, he only had to stay five extra days. Hopkins added: "Tom was nice to work with, but I had no idea what [the movie] was about. Still don't."
Not so busy after all
McKellen also confirms he never saw "Mission: Impossible II," so he probably didn't realize how small a commitment it would've been. However, this also points to why McKellen says that the role would've prevented him from being in "X-Men" and "The Lord of the Rings." If he had accepted "MI:2" and then soon after got calls about playing Magneto and Gandalf, he probably would've turned them down on the grounds he was busy. That would've made the choice extra bitter; once he completed shooting "MI:2," McKellen would've realized that his schedule wasn't that full after all and he missed out on not one, but two roles of a lifetime for naught.
Magneto and Gandalf defined McKellen onscreen in the 2000s. Plenty of young viewers were introduced to him by those roles (including yours truly). Gandalf is the perfect fit for McKellen's grandfatherly gravitas, a quality he flipped on his head to play Magneto, a villain you kind of want to see win. Now, McKellen could have pulled Swanbeck off — the role would've been a cakewalk for him, like it was for Hopkins. However, it's not a part that left an impression on anyone and it's at most a footnote in Hopkins' filmography.
High turnover
Both Gandalf and Magneto also turned into long-term investments for McKellen."X-Men" became a franchise and a harbinger of the superhero movie boom; McKellen played Magneto five times in total, in the original "X-Men" trilogy plus "The Wolverine" and "Days of Future Past." Who knows — given Patrick Stewart's cameo as a Professor X variant in "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness," there might be a place for McKellen to return as Magneto again in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He also reprised Gandalf in "The Hobbit" trilogy (though he didn't have the best time shooting that one).
Swanbeck, though, was a one-and-done job for Hopkins and assuredly would've been one for McKellen too. In almost every "Mission: Impossible" movie, there's a new IMF commander. In "Mission: Impossible III," Swanbeck is replaced by Theodore Brassel (Lawrence Fishburne). In "Ghost Protocol," Brassel is gone and in his place is a new, swiftly killed IMF Secretary (Tom Wilkinson).
Alec Baldwin was the first to defy this tradition, appearing as Alan Hunley in both "Rogue Nation" and the subsequent "Fallout." The upcoming two-part "Dead Reckoning" is also bringing back Eugene Kitteridge (Henry Czerny), the original IMF director from the 1996 original. I doubt we'll ever see Swanbeck return, though: even Hopkins seems to barely recall playing him.
In the aforementioned People interview, McKellen says he believes success is "all about luck — being there at the right time and ready for it." His choice to pass on "MI2" is proof positive of that.
"Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One" releases in theaters on July 12, 2023.