Why Sir Ian McKellen’s Shakespeare monologue has gone viral

Why Sir Ian McKellen’s Shakespeare monologue has gone viral

Sir Ian McKellen delivered a powerful Shakespearean monologue on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, taking the internet by storm.

The Same As It Ever Was

During his appearance this week on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Ian McKellen recited part of a speech known as The Strangers' Case (probably written by William Shakespeare). In it Sir Thomas More, sheriff of London at the time, attempts to subdue a crowd of rioters who are complaining that immigrants should be sent back where they came from. He asks them to imagine themselves as refugees, banished from their own country and forced to live…