Sir Ian McKellen stars in exclusive first look clip as he prepares to lip sync to unheard tapes from iconic artist

Ahead of LS Lowry: The Unheard Tapes airing tomorrow night (Wednesday 25 February) on BBC Two, Radio Times has got a first-look clip from the immersive documentary.

The clip shows Sir Ian McKellen playing Lowry, with the acclaimed actor lip-syncing to previously unheard audio tapes of the artist's voice.

In the clip, Lowry can be heard talking about selling his first painting at the age of 34 in an interview with a researcher called Angela. Both voices are lip-synced, with McKellen playing Lowry, sat in a chair with a plate of food on his lap, and Annabel Smith playing Angela, sat opposite him.

You can watch the full clip above right now.

The tapes featured in the documentary were recorded in the final four years of the artist's life, although the conversation charts his entire life.

The synopsis for the documentary, which will commemorate the 50th anniversary of Lowry's death, says: "This immersive documentary will foreground the touching, charming exchange between the enigmatic Lowry and his often surprising interviewer, a young researcher called Angela, played by Annabel Smith.

"But Lowry’s personal narrative also tells a bigger story, of a seismically changing Greater Manchester, where he lived, worked and painted so prolifically."

On playing Lowry, and how it shaped his understanding of the man, McKellen said: "LS Lowry has throughout my lifetime, I think, been the most popular painter in the United Kingdom. So, it's natural that people should be interested in the man as well as his considerable body of work.

"But he didn't give many interviews and those that he did on-record are rather stilted, in that he seems to have worked out his answers in advance.

"I think the main impression [in these unheard interviews] we get is of a man who is happy to be answering questions. He doesn't feel that Angela is intrusive in any way. In fact, he clearly likes being in her company and only occasionally is he wrong-footed as she delves a bit closer into matters that he perhaps hasn't sorted out, in his own mind.

"I think what I've found as an actor, trying to match the sound of his words to my face and body, is that he was very much enjoying being in her company."

LS Lowry: The Unheard Tapes airs on Wednesday 25 February at 9pm on BBC Two and iPlayer.

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