It’s enough just hearing Sir Patrick Stewart’s clear, measured tones discussing his return to the UK and how heartbreakingly homesick he became at the height of his fame. But you too can enjoy his incredible life story when the famous actor makes an unprecedented stop at the Oxford Playhouse before decamping to New York.

“I lived in California for 18 years, which is a very attractive proposition for many people, but one day I was driving down Beverley Hills Boulevard listening to a classical radio show when Elgar came on and I had to pull over because there were tears coursing down my face, and I thought ‘I’d better do something about this,” he tells me.

So he came home, settling in the Cotswolds, finally finding the peace he’d been yearning for and working almost non-stop in theatre, a genre he’s as passionate about as always.

About to embark on a massively ambitious dual play project on Broadway, and having just finished filming the latest X-Men film, the 72-year-old promises ”a thumbnail sketch of the past 53 years,” at tomorrow’s fundraising do for the Playhouse.

His only condition is that the Q&A session is embargoed: “I’ll answer one Star Trek and one X-Men question only, because otherwise our wonderful fans do take over,” he says diplomatically, “and you have to remember I have a life elsewhere, a world away from fantasy and science fiction.”

Which is the great contradiction of Sir Patrick’s life, the blatant clash of cultures between his thespian, predominantly Shakespearian life in England, and his superstar status as a sci-fi actor in the US — the success of his characters Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek and Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men film series propelling him into the Hollywood big league.

Despite his A-list fame, Sir Patrick struggled for years to align his two career paths, realising that in the US at least he was becoming increasingly typecast: “I did feel Star Trek was rather an albatross around my neck. “I remember going to see a director about another film and he said; ‘why would I want to cast Captain Picard in this?’ So while I’m inordinately proud of everything we achieved on X-Men and Star Trek, it did become something of a handicap,” he admits.

He also suffered from “intense homesickness” which wouldn’t go away. “During the darkest days in LA when I couldn’t sleep I had a virtual picture in my mind of owning my own house in the Cotswolds and what it would look like. I’d go through it room by room, and that was the only way I could get to sleep,” he confesses.

However, on returning to the UK ten years ago it took a while for the work to come in: “It was six months before I was offered anything and I wondered if I’d made a the most calamitous mistake.” But then Huddersfield University asked him to be chancellor, and the RSC offered him an entire season in Antony and Cleopatra and The Tempest “which was wonderful and very unexpected, because all actors expect their next project to be the one where they are found out,” he chuckles.

Currently inundated with work, his New York double Broadway stretch in Waiting For Godot and No Man’s Land with Sir Ian McKellen means he’ll now be away for some considerable time, thanks to his compulsion to continually push and stretch himself: “Well, I like a challenge,” Sir Patrick smiles.

Even his former teacher Cecil Dormand, who introduced the shy Huddersfield lad to Shakespeare and the world of acting, reprimanded him for taking on so much. “Cecil rang this morning and said ‘don’t complain when you are completely tired out. You bring it all on yourself.’ It was like being back in the classroom,” he laughs.

Sir Patrick’s own life story however is as unbelievable as any film plot. Brought up in Yorkshire, his father was an abusive, shell-shocked war veteran, and Sir Patrick’s childhood experiences led him to becoming patron of Refuge, the domestic violence charity.

Which seems the obvious moment to bring up his abusive past at the hands of his father. So I ask whether the stage became his refuge. “Twenty years ago I wouldn’t have answered your questions “ he says quietly, “but yes, the stage was the first place I’ve been where everything was predestined and predetermined. On stage, facing a darkened audience, I was secure and confident and I didn’t have to be myself. It was the safest place to be,” he says simply.

Once introduced to the theatre the seed was sown and the young Patrick Stewart caught three different buses every Sunday to be taught his craft by a former Shakespearian actress, along with fellow teenager Brian Blessed.

However, the prospect of actually making a career of acting was unthinkable. “No one from my background acted — that was absurd.” Instead he took on a short-lived job as a news reporter and then a carpet salesmen, before jacking it in and enrolling at The Bristol Old Vic where he was awarded a scholarship.

“My family were very proud because no one had ever been offered a scholarship for anything, but some years later I discovered that my father’s mother was married and then deserted by an actor, who was never talked about and became the black sheep of the family, so there was a family connection after all.”

Joining the RSC, Sir Patrick went on to play in all the great Shakespeare plays but didn’t make a real name for himself until exasperated, he departed for the US in 1987 and joined the Star Trek crew. Seven years in the series, and four feature films later, X-Men came along by which time Sir Patrick Stewart had become a household name.

“Now that I’ve told you most of my life story I better stop because I’ve got to have something left to tell them on Friday,” he laughs, “but the last ten years have been the happiest of my life. So this is where I come when I don’t have to be anywhere else. “It’s very tranquil and beautiful here and I take pictures of my garden with me wherever I go because it’s such an archetypal English scene,” he says before returning to his current script and his beloved Oxfordshire views.

Charity benefit
Oxford Playhouse
Tomorrow
(Friday), 5pm
Tickets: 01865 305305 or oxfordplayhouse.com