Patrick Stewart on Shylock (Shakespeare On Stage)

Patrick Stewart discusses playing Shylock in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, a role he has played many times, in this ebook taken from Shakespeare On Stage: Volume 2 - Twelve Leading Actors on Twelve Key Roles. In each volume of the Shakespeare On Stage series, a leading actor takes us behind the scenes of a landmark Shakespearean production, recreating in detail their memorable performance in a major role. They leads us through the choices they made in rehearsal, and how the character works in performance, shedding new light on some of the most challenging roles in the canon. The result is a series of individual masterclasses that will be invaluable for other actors and directors, as well as students of Shakespeare - and fascinating for audiences of the plays. In this volume, Patrick Stewart discusses playing the role of Shylock in Rupert Goold's production of The Merchant of Venice for the Royal Shakespeare Company in 2011. This interview, together with the others in the series (with actors such as Ian McKellen, Simon Russell Beale, Alan Rickman and Harriet Walter), is also available in the collection Shakespeare On Stage: Volume 2 - Twelve Leading Actors on Twelve Key Roles by Julian Curry, with a foreword by Nicholas Hytner.

Patrick Stewart is an English actor whose career on stage and screen spans almost six decades. He began his stage career with the Royal Shakespeare Company where he received an Olivier Award for his performance in Antony and Cleopatra (1979) in London's West End. His first major screen roles were on the BBC in the mid-late 1970s, including Hedda, and the I, Claudius miniseries. His role as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation made him a household name, and subsequently his performances as Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men franchise have brought him international acclaim. In 2010, Stewart recieved an OBE for services to drama.