You know, if I had a chance to interview Patrick Stewart, I wouldn't spend four out of my eight questions on Star Trek. What an insult for Newsweek to send a shallow and ignorant reporter with an obvious agenda to an actor with a career as long, varied, and distinguished at Stewart's.
I've been impressed with Patrick Stewart ever since I saw his Claudius in the BBC's 1980 Hamlet (with Derek Jacobi in the title role) in junior high school in the early 1980s. More recently, I was hugely pleased with his current turn as Macbeth, now moved to Broadway. So I really wish I'd been a fly on the wall to watch him take down the reporter who tried so hard in the recent Newsweek interview to make him slam a segment of his audience:
When you're onstage, aren't you worried about weird Trekkie fans in the audience?
Oh, come on, that's just a silly thing to say.
I wasn't a particular fan of ST:TNG and haven't even seen most of it, though I have a huge, huge soft spot in my heart for the original series. And I certainly don't delude myself that any of Star Trek is a work of art on a par with the works of Shakespeare, which are much more interesting to this "weird Trekkie fan" who toddled down to Brooklyn to see Stewart in the Scottish play back in February.
So it's very pleasant to see an actor of Stewart's stature and range actually go out of his way to defend not only the show, but the fans against this sniggering idiot of a reporter:
But they are weird.
How many do you know personally? You couldn't be more wrong. Here's the thing: if you say the fans are weird, that means there is something essentially weird about the show, and there is nothing weird about it. I'm very passionate when people like you snigger.
That last sentence ought to be on a t-shirt or button (paging Nancy Lebovitz...)
Thanks, Mr. Stewart. You have class.
Oh, excellent. Indeed, what a classy guy. TNG was my first Star Trek. I was an adolescent when it premiered, and it was one show my whole family could agree on watching together. So it holds a place in my heart, and Picard is my captain. I'm very proud to say that now. :)
Posted by: kouredios | April 07, 2008 at 07:14 PM
Wow. I am impressed.
Posted by: Serge | April 07, 2008 at 07:26 PM
I think the reporter got off lightly. Stewart created a memorable character in Captain Picard, whatever anyone may think of Star Trek in general and ST:TNG in particular. I think he's also prepared to give the show credit for giving him greater exposure and so a chance at more offers to do interesting parts.
Posted by: fidelio | April 08, 2008 at 08:24 AM
I don't demand that actors in SF shows love SF or even respect it - they're professionals doing a job, and being an actor sometimes means holding your nose and taking the work. If Stewart just took the ST:TNG gig for the money and exposure, and that's given him a way to support his family and the freedom to do Shakespeare at the Chichester Festival, good for him. He could even think the show was weird and the fans are weird (I certainly am!), and as long as he didn't go out of his way to be rude or to make fun, Shatner-style, of the people whose viewing delivers the ratings and justifies his salary, it wouldn't disturb me much.
So I think it's extra-classy of him to go beyond being polite, which is really all that's required, and to make a public point of being passionate about his respect for both the show and its fans. He didn't have to go there; he could easily have just deflected the reporter's idiocy. It makes me happy when people whose professional skills I deeply admire turn out to be worthy of personal respect as well. That's not always the case.
Posted by: Susan de Guardiola | April 08, 2008 at 11:33 AM
I just did some checking about Stewart on imdb.com. According to them, he is a fan of Red Dwarf and of Doctor Who.
Posted by: Serge | April 08, 2008 at 12:16 PM
The irony! I can't comment on your post about comments! Also, re Stewart, I find it hard to imagine imagine someone that good doing something for that long and not being proud of it.
Posted by: Emily | April 09, 2008 at 11:06 AM
Patrick Stewart is also a fan of the (SF*) comic book Transmetropolitan; unless I'm very much mistaken he wrote an introduction to one of the collections. (A swift google sugests I'm right and it's Lonely City).
I'd forgotten he'd played Karla in the John Le Carre adaptions. Until now, my earliest (pre- ST:TNG) memories had been of him as a bloke who shouts a lot in Excalibur and Dune. That says more about me, my film-watching habits and my memory for blokes who shout a lot in films than him.
* Non-superhero
Posted by: Neil Willcox | April 10, 2008 at 09:00 AM
Neil, that's interesting, because it's a settled opinion among certain of my friends that if anybody ever tries to make a film of Transmet it'll star Patrick Stewart. (It's the fact that he has the same hairstyle as the protagonist, as much as anything, I think.)
Posted by: Paul A. | April 11, 2008 at 11:22 AM
Emily:
I didn't think of that as a post, exactly (more like a pathetic plea for attention!) Using the "featured post" method is just the simplest way to get something that will stick at the top of my blog and not vanish down the page.
Obviously I now need to write something clever and comment-spurring about my desire for comments. Hmm.
Posted by: Susan de Guardiola | April 11, 2008 at 12:52 PM