He’s known for playing Captain Picard from Star Trek: Enterprise sure, but Patrick Stewart is just as well-known for playing Professor X in the X-Men movies.
In fact, even despite James McAvoy portraying his younger incarnation, Stewart remains the guy many people think of when they imagine a movie version of Professor X. And you know who else agrees? Marvel themselves.
In an interview with Digital Spy, the 79-year-old actor claimed that he has met with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige and “had long, long conversations.” One of the suggestions for Stewart’s involvement was to reprise his role as Professor Xavier in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
But Patrick Stewart reiterated what he said shortly after the release of Logan in 2017 – that he was done with the role and that the movie, as mentioned above, would be his last X-Men film.
“Here’s the problem … If we had not made ‘Logan,’ then yes, I would probably be ready to get into that wheelchair one more time and be Charles Xavier. But Logan changed all that.”
Patrick Stewart then recalled watching the film alongside Logan and long-time X-Men co-star Hugh Jackman. He emphasized the emotional impact the film had on both of them.
The first time that Hugh and I saw the film in public was at the Berlin Film Festival, which is where the movie premiered. Shortly after Xavier’s death scene, I found myself getting very emotional but I had to keep a hold of myself because we were sitting in the middle of this cinema. And then I saw Hugh’s hand come up to his eye and wipe away a tear. I thought, ‘Dammit, the bugger’s crying. Oh, let it out Patrick. Hugh took my hand, and we held hands with the last seven or eight minutes of the film because there were so many things we were upset about. We were moved by the story. We were moved by one another. We were moved by the movie. But we also made the decision that we were saying goodbye to our characters as well. In that sense, it was not just the deaths of those two men in the franchise, but it was also goodbye to our part in them as well.
Will you miss Patrick Stewart playing Professor X in the X-Men movies? Do you wish he stayed on in the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Share your thoughts in the comments below.