Patrick Stewart Was Convinced Star Trek Fans Didn't Care About Him — Until He Went To A Convention
On October 5, 1987, the New York Times reviewed a new "Star Trek" show that had just debuted. It was set about 85 years after the events of the original "Star Trek," and followed the exploits of one Captain Jean-Luc Picard, played by "the fine British actor Patrick Stewart, formerly of the Royal Shakespeare Company." The review also noted that the new series, called "Star Trek: The Next Generation," featured "a good deal of soaring space music in the manner of 'Star Wars.'" It was an inauspicious write-up for a series that would eventually prove to be at least as popular as its forebear, if not more so. Those of us who were alive in 1987 likely recall a certain amount — not a lot — of doubt surrounding the new series. Some Trekkies were a hair miffed that a new series wouldn't feature Captain Kirk (William Shatner) or Spock (Leonard Nimoy).
Even for those open-minded enough to welcome "The Next Generation" into the zeitgeist, some found it hard to picture a "Star Trek" convention expressing the same amount of enthusiasm for the newcomer as they did for the 1960s classic. Would people turn up to see Stewart in person with the same excited fervor as they might for, say, George Takei? Would people wear the t-shirts, write fan fiction, or stitch together homemade versions of the uniforms?
The answer, of course, would be yes on all counts, and to a multiplicative degree. Indeed, Stewart recalls attending his first "Star Trek" convention back in the late 1980s — a story he relates in his new autobiography "Making It So: A Memoir" — and finding that Trekkies cared about him far more than he might have initially assumed.
Fame!
Right before "The Next Generation" was about to debut on September 28, 1987, Patrick Stewart recalled getting a call from producer Robert Justman who said, "Tonight, more people will see your work than the total number of people who have watched you act in your entire career." This was a massive deal for Stewart's visibility as an actor, and the man was poised to be more famous than he had been even on the British stages from whence he hailed. At the time, however, Stewart didn't want to make himself too excited, playing off the series as little more than a soon-to-be-forgotten appearance on American television.
Reviews started to come in, and, like the write-up from the New York Times, they were blankly descriptive, neutral, or a mite sour. It wasn't until Stewart started hearing from his co-stars that fans were responding positively that he finally knew the show was getting a good response. How did his co-stars know what fans liked? On weekends, they were attending "Star Trek" conventions, events that Stewart knew nothing about.
Stewart asked Marina Sirtis all about it, and, by his recollection, she said, "They've been having them for the old show for years. But now they're having them for us. People are loving the show. You get up on a stage, you do a Q&A, you sign some autographs. It's really gratifying to see the response."
Stewart noted that he was so devoted to getting the role of Picard right that he had essentially cloistered himself off from the rest of the world, filling his weekends with study. By the end of the show's first season, however, he had been thinking about attending a convention, and eventually agreed to go to Denver to see what the fuss was about.
So dark, the Con of Trek
Patrick Stewart swallowed his fears of appearing in an empty room and flew to the Rockies. Well, maybe he didn't swallow all of his fears. Elsewhere in "Making It So," Stewart recalled a time when he was a young man and had just performed on stage. He was exiting the back of the theater hoping to greet adoring fans impressed by his acting, and was met only by a single comely lass in a miniskirt who looked him up and down and dismissively asked, "Are you anybody?" It seems that comment lingered in Stewart's mind as he was about to take the stage before his first convention appearance. He even asked if there was anyone out there at all. He would get his answer in due course. Stewart wrote:
"In due time, I was escorted to the wings, where someone introduced me: 'And here he is, Jean-Luc Picard himself, Patrick Stewart!' I walked out to an audience of over two thousand people, on their feet, roaring. And I hadn't even done anything! I tried to start speaking but could not, because the roar had not abated. I was overwhelmed. At forty-seven years of age, I had stood on stages thousands of times and performed in hundreds of shows. But I had never experienced anything like this."
It seems that fans did indeed like "Star Trek: The Next Generation." All the show's applause was seemingly saved up for that moment. "I thought back again to that mini-skirted girl outside the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford," Stewart continued. "Oh, if only she could see me now, I thought."
If you were the woman in the miniskirt who asked Stewart if he was anybody, know that he's done okay for himself.