Saturday, January 2, 2010

Star Trek's Patrick Stewart Knighted

Patrick Stewart as Captain Picard on Star TrekThere's an especially starry knight in Britain's latest round of royal honors.

Patrick Stewart - "Star Trek: The Next Generation's" Capt. Jean-Luc Picard - becomes Sir Patrick in Queen Elizabeth II's New Year honors list.

"This is an honor that embraces those actors, directors and creative teams who have in these recent years helped fill my life with inspiration, companionship and sheer fun," said 69-year-old Stewart, who recently returned to the British stage following a long career in Hollywood that included playing Professor Charles Xavier in three "X-Men" films.

Sir Patrick Hewes Stewart OBE was born July 13, 1940, in Mirfield, Yorkshire, England, the son of Gladys (née Barrowclough), a weaver and textile worker, and Alfred Stewart, a Regimental Sergeant Major in the British Army who served with the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and previously worked as a general labourer and as a postman.Throughout childhood, he endured poverty and disadvantage, an experience which influenced his later political and ideological beliefs.

He attended Crowlees C of E Junior and Infants School, and in 1951, age 11, he entered Mirfield Secondary Modern School, where he continued to study drama. At age 15, Stewart dropped out of school and increased his participation in local theatre. He acquired a job as a newspaper reporter and obituary writer, but after a year, his employer gave him an ultimatum to choose acting or journalism. He quit the paper. His brother tells the story that Stewart would attend rehearsals during work time and then invent the stories he reported. Stewart also trained as a boxer.

In 2006, Stewart made a short video against domestic violence for Amnesty International, in which he recollected his father's physical attacks on his mother and the effect it had on him as a child, and he has given his name to a scholarship at the University of Huddersfield, where he is Chancellor, to fund post-graduate study into domestic violence. His childhood experiences also led him to become the patron of Refuge, a UK charity for battered women.

In 1957, at the age of 17, he embarked on a two-year acting course at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. He lost most of his hair while still young, but he successfully marketed himself to theatre producers after performing an audition with and without a wig, heralding his performance as "two actors for the price of one!"Patrick Stewart in X-Men

Following a period with the Manchester Library Theatre, he became a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, in 1966, which he held until 1982, he was as an Associate Artist of the company in 1968. He appeared next to actors such as Ben Kingsley and Ian Richardson. In January, 1967 he made his debut TV appearance on Coronation Street as a Fire Officer. He made his Broadway debut as Snout in Peter Brook's legendary production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, 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 Lenin in Fall of Eagles; 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). He also appeared in Sir Kenneth Clark's Civilisation: A Personal View series (Episode 6), as Horatio.

He also had minor roles in several films such as King Leondegrance in John Boorman's Excalibur (1981), the character Gurney Halleck in David Lynch's 1984 film version of Dune and Dr. Armstrong in Tobe Hooper's Lifeforce.

In 1987, after attending a Shakespeare Seminar at UCLA, Stewart went to Los Angeles to star as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987–1994), for which he received a 1995 Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for "Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series." From 1994 to 2002 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); and in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's pilot episode "Emissary".

Patrick StewartHe has also said he is very proud of his work on Star Trek: The Next Generation, 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:

“ [T]he fact is all of those years in Royal Shakespeare Company -- playing all those kings, emperors, princes and tragic heroes -- were nothing but 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. 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."

source


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