Stewart Keeps Busy With Shakespeare and Sports

Patrick Stewart's first love may be Shakespeare, but he admitted to spending recent evenings rooting for the Detroit Tigers to win the World Series.

In an interview with The Detroit News, the actor said that while Captain Picard may have made him famous, he missed performing on the stage during the run of Star Trek: The Next Generation, though he did become a passionate Los Angeles Dodgers fan after his initial experience in a baseball stadium: While on a tour with the Royal Shakespeare Company, he went to Tiger Stadium "and I had a great time."

Currently in Ann Arbor to perform in Antony and Cleopatra and The Tempest, Stewart admitted that he still doesn't know everything about baseball, though "it is a great game, though, a very exciting game" and was a consolation during the 18 years he lived in California, distanced from Shakespeare and the stage. "In January, 40 years to the week after I first joined the RSC, we began rehearsals for 'Antony and Cleopatra' in London. This has been one of the happiest years of my life," he explained.

Stewart will next play Shylock on film in The Merchant of Venice, a would-be revenge drama with a twist, like The Tempest which he described as a revenge play that goes wrong. "Prospero becomes a forgiving brother," he noted. "The rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance."

Stewart will play Antony and Prospero over the next two weeks at the University of Michigan, where he will also conduct the Michigan band at halftime when the football team plays Ball State University. "I expect to make a modest fool of myself," he said.

The full interview is here.

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