Ian McKellen says he imagined destroying Mar-a-Lago for new Avengers movie

Exclusive: At an open-air film festival in Rome, the actor shared anecdotes of his time on the set of upcoming superhero film Avengers: Doomsday On Sunday night at an open-air cinema in Rome, Sir Ian McKellen reenacted for a crowd of 2,000 film fans a moment from upcoming superhero film Avengers: Doomsday. The film, which is released in December, sees a return for the X-Men played by McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The MCU’s 39th feature, it is directed by Anthony and Joe Russo, and intended as a sequel to their 2019 film Avengers: Endgame, which made $2.8bn and is the second highest-grossing film of all time. Speaking in Rome about his experiences shooting the film, McKellen said that at one point “they got me at one point to destroy New Jersey”. Rising from his seat to actor out the scene, he said that the Russos “told me to look more furious: make it look as if you hate what you’re destroying. So I stood there and I shouted: ‘Mar-a-Lago!’” McKellen, 87, introduced one of his favourite films, Jacques Tati’s 1953 comedy Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday – which he described watching as a 14-year-old with a friend. “More than a friend, really,” he said.