‘I love that there’s this big gay thing in the middle of Scotland’: Ian McKellen and Graham Norton join Alan Cumming for Out in the Hills

January 19, 2026

New LGBTQ+ festival included McKellen in a fiery monologue and Norton in conversation, as well as a queer ceilidh and ‘kilted yoga’

Sir Ian McKellen is on stage blowing up a red balloon. For a man of 86, he has impressive lung capacity. He lets it go and watches it take a satisfyingly theatrical trajectory, rising to a height, then plummeting. “Free the spirit,” he says, in character as Ed, an elderly gay man searching for release.

There was a lot of spirit-freeing over the weekend at Pitlochry Festival theatre. In a bold pre-season move by new artistic director Alan Cumming, the UK’s most idyllic venue launched its first LGBTQ+ festival in an atmosphere of exuberance. Programmed by Lewis Hetherington, Out in the Hills was a three-day compendium of talks, scratch performances and workshops that turned a sedate theatre into a buzzy social hive.

Source: www.theguardian.com

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Written by: truelightfm

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