X-Men, Star Trek actor Patrick Stewart dies

Sir Patrick Stewart, best known for portraying of intelligent leaders in the Star Trek and X-Men franchises, has died at age 86. A post on his social media account announced that he died on Wednesday after a brief battle with Alzheimer’s disease and Lewy Body Dementia. 

What did his coworkers say about him? His X-Men co-star, Hugh Jackman, posted photos of them together, saying that he learned much from Stewart and said he will miss him the rest of his days. William Shatner, who preceded Stewart as a frontman for the Star Trek franchise, said that Stewart brought intelligence, grace, and a deep sense of humanity to everything he did.

“Captain Picard stood for the best of us, and so did the man who played him,” Shatner said of Stewart’s character. 

What did his career look like? Stewart was classically trained at the Royal Shakespeare Company and had a successful six-decade career spanning broadway, movies, and television. 

As Capt. Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation, he led a crew of humans, aliens and an android exploring the space aboard the Starship Enterprise. His trademark commands included “Make it so!” “You have the conn” and “Phasers on stun, Mr. Worf!” The character of Picard mixed diplomacy with courage and creative thinking to survive each episode. Another well-known role was Professor Charles Xavier, the telepathic, wheelchair-bound leader of superpowered mutants in the X-Men films ripped from comic books. 

However, he also performed on stage in plays such as a one-man rendition of “A Christmas Carol” Broadway runs of Harold Pinter’s “No Man’s Land,” and “Waiting for Godot”. His performance of Macbeth earned him a Tony Award nomination. 

In a 2020 interview with Square Mile magazine, Stewart said he was not a person of faith and did not believe in an afterlife. Humanists UK, which describes itself as a charity for nonreligious people, mourned him as one its long-standing supporters and noted that he had campaigned for access to euthanasia.