Royal Shakespeare Theatre

You could hear it in his accented voice and in the stern honesty with which he told you what he thought or felt.

Yorkshiremen have no truck with half-trues, avoidance of big issues he wore his heart on his sleeve which made him a man to rely on to admire and in my case love he then reflected on where they first crossed paths at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and later a few years in London when he told me about an offer to take over a leading part in Star Trek said but patrick think of your stage career in the uk do you really want to risk getting lost in hollywood for years and years well he took the risk and thank goodness for us that he did for not just he his devoted trekkies but film and theater audiences who marveled at his uh using international celebrity and a star in a string of cinema successes x-men of course And in great classical plays by Shakespeare, Ibsen, Arthur Miller, Peter Schaeffer, Pinter, and Beckett at Stratford-upon-Avon in London's West End and on Broadway.

But yeah, Ian McKellen said that Patrick was one of the guys that when he decided to come out, totally supported him and befriended him and became an activist for civil rights and women's rights and uh

And Animal Rights, too, who's a big advocate for, especially pit bulls, big advocate for pit bull rescue and advocacy.

I was a theater actor, and in Britain, Star Trek aired, as I recall, about 6 o'clock on a Saturday evening.

Particularly when I was working at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, I could get home between matinee and evening performances.

So I'd come home to have tea with my children, maybe even get to put them to bed, and sometimes they would be watching Star Trek.

And his

People have to see it the way I want them to see it, not spinning full speed ahead.

Many of the termospheres are inside-out six-dimensional buildings depicting famous structures, from the Blue Mosque in Istanbul to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in London and my favourite piece, St Mark's Square in Venice.

Beautiful.

People tell me that it's not accurate because it doesn't have enough pigeons.

And then Jonathan stops the applause and he delivers the epilogue, which is very much an appeal to the audience.

And it is just so sweet and moving that whatever is wrong with the world, circling back to where we began this discussion, you leave the Royal Shakespeare Theatre absolutely floating on air.

It's funny that I've not often seen you speak with such tenderness of a play that you've seen.

That's the word.

Then I drifted into comedy acting through doing stand-up, and that was something I really enjoyed, but it wasn't the only thing I ever wanted to do.

There was a time when I was younger where I just wanted to be at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre." Which is quite interesting, because I just would've assumed he'd always just wanted to be a comedy actor, but he really does take this seriously.

And it's interesting seeing the, the sort of him talking about when they were making the film and how they had this disconnect, uh, with the supporting cast and extras at, at the beginning, because they were just, you know, w- wanting to sort of clock off as soon as it was, uh, as soon as the contracted hours were done.

And I know the Americans can often moan about production-

Um, and I noticed that several theaters do ghost tours now, including the Lyceum in Sheffield.

Um, but I've also included, um, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford and, um, there's one of the theaters in the West End in there as well, and, and that links into hauntings that have, have taken place.

It's the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, and I think going back there was some argument with, uh, two of the actors and, and one of them stabbed one, one of the others in the 19th century, and that actor is, is meant to be, uh, uh, sort of haunting the, the, the stage there.

Um, but also the theater is really wrapped up in a lot of superstition, um, as well.

1940, there's a Twelfth Night production on Broadway, which had a very long run for Broadway at the time, with Helen Hayes as Viola.

Uh, 1950, back at the Old Vic, '55 at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre.

This time Laurence Olivier is in the production, and of course he's the leading man.

Who's he gonna play? Malvolio, the leading male part.