The Silent Runner

The image of Christianity in ‘Chariots of Fire’ was gay.

When I was a kid growing up Evangelical, those Hollywood movies were cesspools of sin—but we could watch Chariots of Fire. It was Christian, even if it did win the 1981 Oscar for Best Picture. I remember thinking there was something a little different about the lead actor, Ian Charleson, who played the devout runner.

I reflect on his amazing life. He became world-famous for playing a Christian man. He represented Christianity for a generation.

They tried not to notice when he died of AIDS.

He was born in 1949 to a working class family in Edinburgh. He was named after his father, ‘John Charleson’, but was always called ‘Ian’—a new identity appearing on its own.

I’m reading For Ian Charleson, a collection of reminiscences published in 1990, all that would ever be written biographically.

A friend, Ewen Maclachlan, sketching out his life, quotes Charleson saying his youth was spent “living in a complete dream world.” He was gifted, singing and dancing, acting in plays and painting. He got a college scholarship to study architecture, but he was out to create structures the world didn’t yet understand. “In one exam he made a magnificent bridge with no foundations.”