Ian McKellen has paid tribute to his “X-Men” series co-star and longtime friend Patrick Stewart, who died on Wednesday at the age of 86.
McKellen and Stewart’s relationship goes back decades as young theater actors with the Royal Shakespeare Company. When they starred opposite each other in Marvel’s “X-Men” film series, playing the maniacal Magneto and Professor X, they became inseparable to general audiences. Over the years, the two have shared a public friendship, frequently appearing at premieres of each other’s works and acting as two of British theatre’s leading global ambassadors. In 2009, he starred in the West End production of “Waiting for Godot”.
McKellen wrote in a statement posted on social media, “Before everything else, Patrick was defined by being born and raised in Yorkshire, the proud county in the north of England, which he loved to the end. You could hear it in his accented voice and the brutal honesty with which he told you what he thought and felt. Yorkshiremen have no desire for half-truths or avoiding the big issues.” “He wore his heart on his sleeve, which made him someone to trust, admire, and in my case, love.”
McKellen recalled Stewart’s decision to play Jean-Luc Picard in “Star Trek: The Next Generation” in the late ’80s — a role that cemented his presence in Hollywood and made him a household name to general audiences.
“We first met half a century ago as aspiring young actors with the Royal Shakespeare Company, but we were not in the same production. My first strong memory was of him on a central London street a few years later, when he told me about an offer to play a leading role in ‘Star Trek’. ‘But Patrick, think about your stage career in the UK. Do you really want to risk being lost in Hollywood for years and years?'” McKellen continued. “Well, they took risks and we thank God for all they did, not only for their dedicated Trekkies but also for the film and theater audiences who saw the great classical plays of Shakespeare, Ibsen, Arthur Miller, Peter Shaffer, Pinter and Beckett in Stratford-upon-Avon, London’s West End and on Broadway. Surprised at using an international celebrity to act.”
“America was his adopted home, where he met his beloved Sunny, who cared for him through thick and thin, in sickness and in health. But he never left his native: and the proudest achievement of the most respected and beloved actor of his generation on both sides of the Atlantic was his appointment as Chancellor of the University of Huddersfield in Yorkshire.”
McKellen and Stewart will be seen on screen together for the last time in Marvel’s “Avengers: Doomsday,” scheduled to hit theaters in December. Both reprized their roles as Magneto and Professor X.