Patrick Stewart may have oozed British nobility, but his roots in Toronto run deep. From his early days performing on a Toronto stage to filming the first X-Men movie around the city, the late actor had a surprisingly long connection.
To honour the late great actor, the Royal Alexandra Theatre will dim its marquee lights Tuesday evening in memory of Stewart, who died Oct. 28 at age 86.
The tribute, organized by Mirvish Productions, will take place at 8 p.m. and honours an actor whose connections to Toronto stretch back more than 50 years.
Stewart, best known to millions as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men films, performed at the Royal Alexandra Theatre in May 1975. According to Mirvish, he played Ejlert Løvborg opposite Glenda Jackson in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s production of Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler. The stage production was then adapted into a film featuring the original cast.
His relationship with Toronto’s theatre continued decades later. In 2008, David Mirvish produced a Broadway production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, starring Stewart in the title role. The production received five Tony Award nominations.
But it was his work in the first X-Men movie that created the most lasting connection between Stewart and Toronto.
Released in 2000, the original X-Men, directed by Bryan Singer, was filmed in Toronto and surrounding communities in 1999. Stewart’s Professor Xavier became one of the defining characters of the X-Men movies, and several familiar local landmarks were transformed in the process.
One of the best connections is Roy Thomson Hall, across the street from the Royal Alexandra Theatre, where Stewart’s first on-screen appearance as Professor Xavier was filmed.
The scene has Xavier and his friend and nemesis Magneto, played by another iconic actor by the name of Ian McKellen, meeting inside the building’s glass-and-steel architecture.
Another major Toronto location was Casa Loma, which served as the interior of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. The castle’s gorgeous and grandiose hallways, staircases and rooms provided the setting for the school where young mutants learned to understand and control their powers.
The Distillery District also made an appearance, its historic industrial buildings used to recreate a Nazi concentration camp in the film’s opening sequence, when the young Magneto discovers his powers during the Second World War.
It was this movie that really went a long way to establishing Toronto as one of the premiere places to film movies in the world. And Stewart was front and centre.
Stewart’s other screen role also has a small Toronto connection, although more of the trivia variety than anything too meaningful. Star Trek: The Next Generation was filmed primarily in California, but Toronto City Hall made a brief appearance in the 1989 episode “Contagion.”
On Nov. 3, the Royal Alexandra Theatre offers a fitting tribute to the actor: a moment of darkness in honour of an iconic performer who spent much of his life in the spotlight.