NOTES ON RECENT READING
Patrick Stewart’s
MAKING IT SO: A MEMOIR (2023)
By Samuel L. Leiter
Sir Patrick Stewart, one of England’s most respected actors, has an impressive resume for his classical theatre work, especially in Shakespeare, but his career includes countless roles in other plays, modern and antique, as well as on screens large and small. Stewart’s worldwide fame, however, rests not on his distinguished stage work, but mainly on his role as Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the Federation starship USS Enterprise in the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation, and its multiple film and TV spinoffs, most recently Star Trek: Picard.
I have long been a great admirer of Sir Patrick but—full disclosure—I
have never watched a single episode of the enormously popular series, nor any
of its cinema progeny. I admit, however, to having watched all the show’s
original episodes, starring William Shatner, during its three-year run from
1966-1969.
No matter, I got a full dose of Captain Picard and his crew from
Stewart’s thoroughly engrossing new book, Making It So: A Memoir (New
York: Gallery Books, 2023, 469 pp.)—its title a Picard catchphrase—about as smoothly
digestible a personal account of a premiere actor’s life as one could wish. I know
the word “memoir” is nowadays considered preferable for such works, but if
anything could also be considered an autobiography this book is it.
Born into relative poverty in 1940 (seven days before me) in
the town of Mirfield, in North England’s Yorkshire County, Stewart grew up in a
tiny, two-room house with its toilet out-of-doors, a space that often served as
the only place he could read in private, holding a candle to see in the
darkness. He describes his upbringing, including his schooling, his
friendships, and his hardscrabble life in general, in vivid detail, with close
attention to his family circumstances: moody father, a decorated former army
parachutist down on his luck after being demobilized; loving mother, a textile millworker,
sometimes at her husband’s mercy; and two brothers, with one of whom he shared
a bed until he was 14. He admits that for years he felt inferior about his
working-class roots, Yorkshire accent, and incomplete academic education.
He lovingly describes what growing up in Yorkshire, which he
remembers with deep fondness, was like. Local accents like his play a big role
in English culture, so he eventually was taught to ditch his in favor of what
was called “received pronunciation.” At one point, however, an acting teacher observed
how much more interesting his speech was when a bit of Northern England broke
through.
Although academically only average, he was a voracious
reader. He gained the affection and respect of a few teachers—especially Cecil
Dormand—who had a huge influence on him, especially when he began to find
fulfillment by acting in school projects and local amateur dramatic societies (“am-drams”).
Never, at first, considering a theatre career, his jobs on finishing school at
15 included working as a furniture and carpet salesman and then as a cub
reporter.
But, with Dormand’s support, he began taking long bus rides to
study privately with Meg Wynn Owen on Saturdays (another famous actor, Brian
Blessed, was also a student), and eventually, at 17, was accepted into the Bristol
Old Vic Theatre School, with a grant from a local council covering all his
expenses. Theatre students will appreciate his exposition of the BOVTS training
regimen he underwent.
They will also enjoy his expert insights and often funny
anecdotes about acting, including wonderful stories in which he himself is
sometimes the goat. Stewart’s love for acting and his enthusiasm in expressing
it is one of his book’s great charms. While the persona he projects from stage
and screen may sometimes seem stern, he reveals a warm, human sense of humor,
often self-deprecating, that will endear him to his readers. Even now, at 83,
he would love to do a TV comedy series.
The famously eggheaded—physically, not cerebrally—star even
candidly discloses how, after his hair began thinning at 17, he was—after
failed hair-growing treatments—as bald at 19 as he is today. His baldness may
have hampered his career as a leading man, but it boosted his character-role
appropriateness. His love life didn’t suffer, though, as the thrice-married
actor’s cherished memories of girlfriends and lovers shows. Stewart offers loving
tributes to each of his wives, beginning with the choreographer Sheila Falconer,
to whom he was wed from 1966-1990 before the typical problem of show biz
logistics made divorce inevitable.
After his two years at Bristol, things looked bleak back
home in Mirfield, but before long he was offered a job as assistant stage manager
and bit part actor at the Theatre Royal, Lincoln. Low level as it was, it was the
start of a professional career, and he was on his way to nearly nonstop employment
that would take him from polishing his craft in regional rep to an out-of-the-blue
shot, at 21, playing tiny roles on a globe-hopping Old Vic World Tour with gorgeous
actress Vivien Leigh (he offers lovely stories about her), more regional rep, and,
ultimately, a long-dreamed of position with the Royal Shakespeare Company when
he was only 25, a job he held for 14 years.
In 1975, he made his first feature film, Hennessy, but
even after a few films (including Dune), and TV appearances, he remained
a respected supporting actor, little known to the world at large; even the RSC only
rarely granted him one of the big Shakespeare roles, while fellow thespians
like David Warner and Ian McKellen became internationally known artists. It
wasn’t until he lucked out with Star Trek in the 1980s, when he was in
his mid-40s—a story he tells with brio—that he broke out into superstardom. Trekkies
will love his many Star Trek anecdotes, the show having run seven years,
with a movie franchise following.
Star Trek: Next Generation over, he returned to the
stage with a well-received, one-man version of A Christmas Carol followed
by leading roles in multiple plays, from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? to
Shakespeare’s The Tempest, The Merchant of Venice (which he’s
done four times), and Macbeth (also filmed). But he also landed
in hot water when, starring on Broadway in Arthur Miller’s The Ride Down Mt.
Morgan, he gave curtain speeches criticizing the Shuberts for closing the
show early.
His film and TV career flourished, including the X-Men franchise,
in which he played Professor X (and cemented his friendship with Ian McKellen,
with whom he’d eventually do the greatest Waiting for Godot I’ve ever
seen, and, in repertory, an equally outstanding No Man’s Land, by Harold
Pinter. His popularity even earned him a hosting job on SNL (which, he
admits, bombed). However, his first two marriages broke up (he confesses to philandering)
before he married a third time—lastingly, one hopes—to Sunny Ozell, a singer 39
years his junior, with whom he appears to have found true love.
Filled with wonderful memories, personal and professional, many
worthy of a laugh, some more poignant, Making It So is for anyone interested
in the life of a leading modern British actor during the last half of the 20th
and first quarter of the 21st centuries. For all his success and
acclaim, Patrick Stewart, for all his fame (he was knighted in 2010), remains
starstruck by the greats of his profession, thrilled to be in their company, or,
for that matter, with any talented professionals. His encounters with his
idols, like Ian Holm, are unforgettable, while his anecdotes about celebrities
like Sting, about whom he admits to having known nothing when they first met on
the set of Dune, and the young Paul McCartney, will appeal to readers across
the spectrum.
If Sir Patrick Stewart is anything like the modest man that
this book projects, thankful for the good things that came his way, grateful to
those who enabled them, and proud of what they led to, he’s someone whose hand
I’d like to shake one day. Having spent a week in his company, I think it’s
about time we finally spent some time together aboard the USS Enterprise.
Beam me up! Or, to be au courant, make it so!
