Patrick Stewart
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- For the American soldier, see Patrick Stewart (soldier).
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| Born: | July 13, 1940 (age 66) Mirfield, Yorkshire, England |
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| Occupation: | Actor |
Patrick Stewart, OBE, (born July 13, 1940) is an English film, television, and stage actor and Chancellor of the University of Huddersfield.
Throughout his career, Stewart has performed various characters in Shakespearean productions and has led a distinguished career in the theatre for nearly fifty years. However, he is publicly most famous for his roles as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and as Professor Xavier in the X-Men film franchise. His bald head and classically-trained vocal mannerisms are his most-recognized traits.
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[edit] Biography
Stewart was born in Mirfield, Huddersfield, Yorkshire, England, although he spent much of his childhood in Jarrow. His first appearance on stage was at a local outdoor history pageant as Tom of Towngate when he was 9. At the age of 12, he entered the local secondary modern school where he continued to study drama. He has said that "the greatest thing that ever happened to me" was after he read Shylock aloud in front of his class and his teacher told him, "Stewart, you're good at this. You should do it for a living."
At 15, he dropped out of school and increased his participation in local theatre. He acquired a job as a newspaper reporter, but after a year, his employer gave him an ultimatum to choose acting or journalism. He quit the job. His brother tells the story that Stewart would attend rehearsals during work time and then invent the stories he reported. Supposedly, this caught up with him the night of a large fire of which, when questioned by his boss, he knew nothing about.
At 16 he was a furniture salesman. In 1957, at the age of 17, he embarked on a two-year acting course at the world famous Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. He lost most of his hair by the age of 19 (alopecia runs in his family), but he successfully sold himself to theatre producers after performing an audition with and without a wig, heralding his performance as "two actors for the price of one!". In 1964 he met the Old Vic's choreographer Sheila Falconer and they married on March 4, 1966. They had two children — Daniel Freedom Stewart and Sophie Alexandra Stewart — but divorced in 1990.[1] Daniel Stewart would have a small role playing Picard's son in an alternate universe in the Next Generation episode, The Inner Light.
Following a period with the Manchester Library Theatre, he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1966 where he appeared next to actors such as Ben Kingsley and Ian Richardson — and even played on the company's football (soccer) team. He then moved to the Royal National Theatre in the early 1980s. Over the years, Stewart took roles in many major television series without ever becoming a household name. He appeared as Sejanus in I, Claudius; Karla in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Smiley's People; Claudius in a 1980 BBC adaptation of Hamlet. He even took the romantic male lead in the BBC adaptation of Mrs Gaskell's North and South (wearing a hairpiece).
Diehard fans will recognize him in a minor role as King Leondegrance in John Boorman's Excalibur (1981). He played the character Gurney Halleck in David Lynch's 1984 film version of Dune. Much of his part was cut from the original release of the film due to editing made to make the immensely long film shorter. Much of this footage was restored for the syndicated television broadcast of the film and the subsequent DVD video release.
In 1987, after doing a Shakespeare Seminar at UCSB, Stewart went to Los Angeles to star as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994). From 1994 he also portrayed Picard in the movie spin-offs Star Trek: Generations (1994), Star Trek: First Contact (1996), Star Trek: Insurrection (1998), and Star Trek: Nemesis (2002). He also played Picard in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's pilot episode "Emissary".
In 1997 he became engaged to Wendy Neuss, production assistant of Star Trek: Voyager (1995-2001). They married on August 25, 2000, only later to divorce on October 14, 2003. Four months before the divorce in June of that year he played opposite 24-year-old actress Lisa Dillon in a production of The Master Builder. Despite the large difference in age, the two fell in love and dated.
Stewart has said that his life was substantially changed by Star Trek, and he has been quoted as saying:
| It was almost entirely a blessing. It introduced me to a world I never expected to be a part of — celebrity, fame, financial success. It also gave me the chance to work with the finest group of people I've ever known. |
He has also said he is very proud of his work on Star Trek: TNG, for its social message and educational impact on young viewers. On being questioned about the significance of his role compared to his distinguished Shakespearean career, Stewart has said:
| One day, out of irritation, I said, you know all of those years with the Royal Shakespeare Company, all those years of playing kings and princes and speaking blank verse, and bestriding the landscape of England was nothing but a preparation for sitting in the captain's chair of the Enterprise. |
The accolades he has received include "Sexiest Man on Television" (TV Guide, 1992), which he considered an unusual distinction considering his age and his baldness. (That same year, Cindy Crawford was voted the sexiest woman in the same poll.) Paramount executives had been concerned about Stewart's baldness, and before he took the role of Picard they insisted he do a screen test wearing a wig. The results were unsatisfactory, and all agreed that Stewart looked better bald. In an interview with Michael Parkinson, he expressed gratitude for Gene Roddenberry's riposte to a reporter who said, "Surely they would have cured baldness by the 24th century," to which Roddenberry replied, "In the 24th Century, they wouldn't care." A few years later on Jonathan Ross's talk show, he said that his last patch of hair looked so out of place that while visiting friends his hosts actually held him down and cut off the offending lock.
Stewart had said after the failure of Star Trek: Nemesis another Star Trek: Next Generation film would be unlikely. However, in December 2005, Stewart disclosed that talks are in the process for another Star Trek film, and that after fulfilling his previous commitments, he would be open to the possibility of reprising his role as Jean-Luc Picard. On April 20, 2006, a new Star Trek movie was announced by Paramount (Star Trek XI). There is some speculation about which era the movie will be set in, so it is not clear if Stewart will play a role.
In 1991, he performed his one-man-play adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol in which he performed the roles of all of the 40-plus characters himself. His radiant energy and marvelous performance was repeated the following year in 1992 and then 1993, 1994, 1996 and then again, for the benefit of survivors and victims' families in the September 11, 2001 attacks. Stewart performed the play again for a 23-day run in London's West End in December 2005. For his performances in this play, he has received the Drama Desk Award for Best Solo Performance in 1992 and the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Entertainment for Solo Performance in 1994. 1997 would see Patrick invert Shakespeare's Othello. Originally a play about a black African entering a white Society, Patrick had wanted to play the title role since the age of 14, so he (along with director Jude Kelly), inverted the play so Othello became a White man in a Black Society. In 1995, he performed Prospero in William Shakespeare's The Tempest, on Broadway, in New York City, a role he would reprise in Rupert Goold's 2006 production of The Tempest as part of the Royal Shakespeare Company's Complete Works Festival.[1]
He has played a great range of characters, from the flamboyantly gay Sterling in the 1995 film Jeffrey to King Henry II in Lion in Winter (2003) and Captain Ahab in a made-for-TV movie version of Moby Dick (for which he was nominated for an Emmy Award).
In late 2003, during the eleventh and final season of NBC's Frasier, Stewart appeared on the show as a gay Seattle socialite who mistakes Frasier for a potential lover.
Stewart has also starred in X-Men, X2 and X-Men: The Last Stand as Charles Xavier. The films' success has appeared to have resulted in another lucrative regular role in the burgeoning superhero film series. He has also since voiced the role in videogames such as X-Men Legends II, although some of the games are more closely tied to the original comicbooks rather than the movies.
Speaking at the launch of the Take A Stand anti-bullying campaign in association with Charity of the Year Beat Bullying, Stewart said he wasn’t convinced that X3 would be the franchise’s own last stand. "When it comes to it you can never say it’s the last because a lot of it is about economic drive. The first two films were among the most successful films ever, if the third continues that theme, I would imagine there’s a strong possibility that within a short while a fourth one might be in the planning." [2]
In 2005, he signed up to play the role of Professor Ian Hood, the lead character in an ITV science-fiction thriller series Eleventh Hour, created by Stephen Gallagher.[3] The first episode was broadcast on January 19, 2006.
Stewart also, notably, appeared in Ricky Gervais's television series Extras, as a last-minute replacement for Jude Law. For playing himself, he was nominated for an Emmy Award in 2006 for Guest Actor in a Comedy Series.[4]
Although he has had a tremendous amount of success doing films, he prefers theatre. He told reporters that "Ingmar Bergman was once asked which he preferred and said, 'I love making movies, but the theatre is my life.' That exactly sums it up for me, too."
Stewart is currently the Chancellor of the University of Huddersfield. Stewart is a lifelong supporter of the British Labour Party.
Stewart was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2001 New Year Honours list.
Stewart was at one time considered for the role of Willy Wonka in the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to which he (like many other Hollywood actors) had great interest in playing. Stewart was particularly interested because he enjoys playing characters from books.
In October/November of 2006, Stewart accompanied the Royal Shakespeare Company as they performed The Tempest, Antony and Cleopatra and Julius Caesar at the University of Michigan. He took part in the residency playing Prospero in The Tempest and Antony in Antony and Cleopatra.
[edit] Voice acting
Stewart has lent his recognizable voice to a number of projects. He has narrated recordings of Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf, Vivaldi's The Four Seasons, C. S. Lewis's The Last Battle (part of the series The Chronicles of Narnia), Rick Wakeman's Return to the Centre of the Earth, and as the narrator in the soundtrack of The Nightmare Before Christmas, as well as numerous TV programs such as High Spirits with Shirley Ghostman. Stewart provided the narration for Nine Worlds, an astronomical tour of the solar system. He is also heard as the voice of the Magic Mirror in Disneyland's live show, Snow White - An Enchanting Musical.
He also was a voice actor on several animated films, including The Prince of Egypt, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, Chicken Little, The Pagemaster, as well as the English dubbings of the Japanese anime films Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind by Hayao Miyazaki and Steamboy. He voiced the pig Napoleon in a TV adaptation of George Orwell's Animal Farm and guest starred in the Simpsons episode "Homer the Great" as Number One. More recently, he has played a semi-recurring role as CIA Deputy Director Avery Bullock (lending his likeness as well as his voice) on the animated series American Dad. In 2005, Stewart voiced Bambi's father, The Great Prince of the Forest in Disney's direct-to-video sequel, Bambi II.
He loaned his voice to a number of Activision produced computer games, including Star Trek: Armada, Armada II, Bridge Commander, and Elite Force II, all reprising his role as Captain Picard.
Bethesda Softworks have announced that Stewart will be reprising his role as Jean-Luc Picard for the forthcoming Star Trek: Legacy PC and Xbox 360 video game along with the four other Star Trek television captains.[5]
In addition to voicing his characters from Star Trek and X-Men in several related computer and video games, Stewart also worked as a voice actor on games unrelated to both franchises, such as Lands of Lore, Forgotten Realms: Demon Stone, and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. He also lent his voice to several editions of the Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia.
His voice talents also appeared in a couple of commercials including the UK TV Advert for Domestos 5x Longer Bleach.
[edit] Trivia
- Patrick Stewart is probably the most famous living supporter of Huddersfield Town Football Club [6], following in the footsteps of former British Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson.
- According to NNDB, "He considered taking the more-traveled Hollywood path of hiring chauffeurs and security, but thought it might eventually impede his ability to play ordinary characters. Instead he resolutely does his own shopping, driving, and other errands, keeping his familiar face tilted downward but interacting with strangers everywhere he goes. Still, Stewart is often described as taking himself a tad too seriously. On the Star Trek set, he once stalked away from scheduled interviews with Good Morning America when he thought the chat show was treating Star Trek in an undignified manner. On Broadway, he once stepped out of character to berate audience members for talking too loudly, and on another occasion he interrupted the post-performance applause to criticize the play's producers for insufficiently advertising the production." [2]
- Patrick Stewart is known to be a fan of the comic book Transmetropolitan, going so far as to have written the introduction to the fifth compilation, "Lonely City".
- Patrick Stewart is an admitted fan of the British scifi-sitcom series Red Dwarf, and was one of those interviewed on its "A-to-Zed Compendium" special, as well as providing the introduction.
- During the RSC's fall 2006 residency in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Stewart made an appearance at the Ball State vs. University of Michigan football game. He directed the Michigan Marching Band to the Star Trek theme song during their halftime show, then told the Wolverines to "Boldly go, and beat the Buckeyes!", and after a quieting of the crowd, "Make it so, number one!" This was a reference to their upcoming game against the, at the time, Associated Press #1 ranked Ohio State University football team.
- The initial reconstruction of the face of the Kennewick man was noted to bear a special resemblance to Stewart. This was amidst the discussion that this reconstruction contained a staggering number of Caucasoid features, a development unexpected from the remains of a Native American.
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Theatrical performances
1997 – The Shakespeare Theatre Company (Washington, DC), Stewart in a "photo negative" production of Othello with an otherwise all-black cast.
2006 – Plays Prospero in The Tempest at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, and Mark Anthony in Anthony and Cleopatra at the Swan Theatre, for the Royal Shakespeare Company as part of the cycle performing all Shakespeare's works in a year
[edit] References and external links
- PatrickStewart.org - The Patrick Stewart Network (official fan club).
- Patrick Stewart at the Internet Broadway Database
- Trek star's space travel unease BBC interview
- Patrick Stewart article at Memory Alpha, the Star Trek wiki.
- Patrick Stewart at Yahoo! Movies
- Interview with Sue Lawley on Desert Island Discs
| Major Cast Members of Star Trek: The Next Generation | |||
| Patrick Stewart | Jonathan Frakes | Brent Spiner | LeVar Burton | Michael Dorn | Gates McFadden | Marina Sirtis | Wil Wheaton | Denise Crosby | Diana Muldaur | |||
Categories: English film actors | English stage actors | English television actors | English voice actors | Family Guy actors | Royal Shakespeare Company members | Star Trek: Deep Space Nine actors | Star Trek: The Next Generation actors | Star Trek film actors | X-Men film actors | Nicktoons voice actors | Natives of West Yorkshire | Officers of the Order of the British Empire | X-Men actors | Olivier Award winners | Hollywood Walk of Fame | People associated with the University of Huddersfield | Alumni of the University of Huddersfield | 1940 births | Living people
