Miscellaneous

Patrick Stewart dies at 86

RSC veteran became Star Trek captain at 47 after Hollywood called him too old, Professor X role followed at 60 and his last interview vowed never to retire

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Patrick Stewart as Professor Charles Xavier in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006). Photograph: 20thC.Fox/Everett/Shutterstock Patrick Stewart as Professor Charles Xavier in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006). Photograph: 20thC.Fox/Everett/Shutterstock theguardian.com
Peter Bradshaw Peter Bradshaw theguardian.com
‘A whole new generation of Trekkers found a charismatic new leader to rally round’ … Patrick Stewart in the 2002 film Star Trek: Nemesis. Photograph: Globe Photos/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock ‘A whole new generation of Trekkers found a charismatic new leader to rally round’ … Patrick Stewart in the 2002 film Star Trek: Nemesis. Photograph: Globe Photos/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock theguardian.com
Stewart opposite Ian McKellen in 2000’s X-Men. Photograph: 20thC.Fox/Everett/Shutterstock Stewart opposite Ian McKellen in 2000’s X-Men. Photograph: 20thC.Fox/Everett/Shutterstock theguardian.com
Patrick Stewart, 86, said he had no plans to retire from Hollywood Patrick Stewart, 86, said he had no plans to retire from Hollywood dailymail.com

Patrick Stewart has died at 86, closing a career that Hollywood had twice written off before it properly began. The Yorkshire-born actor spent his thirties and forties on stage with the Royal Shakespeare Company, playing Sejanus opposite Derek Jacobi in 'I, Claudius' and King Leodegrance in John Boorman's 'Excalibur', while television executives considered him too bald and too old for leading roles. Roddenberry's casting changed that in 1987, when 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' put a Shakespearean veteran in the captain's chair of the Enterprise. The contrast with William Shatner's clean-cut action-romantic Kirk was deliberate, and it worked: the series ran until 1994, spawned four feature films, and eventually its own sequel series, 'Star Trek: Picard'. A further series, 'Star Trek: Nemesis', followed in 2002. The superhero franchise then repeated the trick. As Professor Charles Xavier — wheelchair-using founder of the X-Men, first on screen in 2000 — Stewart faced Ian McKellen's Magneto, both men carrying RSC credentials into a comic-book blockbuster. The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw credits Stewart with bringing gravitas and complexity to roles the industry had assumed required neither. In his final interviews, Stewart insisted he never intended to retire. William Shatner, the man whose shadow he escaped, led the tributes.