Star Trek and X-Men star Patrick Stewart was very vocal when it came to the things he was passionate about, but you might be surprised to learn that one of those things was Mike Judge’s classic animated series Beavis and Butt-Head. Stewart’s love for the show went way back, with the late actor giving the beloved cartoon characters a shout-out during a backstage segment from the 1996 MTV Movie Awards.
“My only sadness is that two very good friends of mine are apparently not here tonight, and I think it’s unfortunate that they were left out,” Stewart said with a straight face, before revealing that he was referring to Beavis and Butt-Head:
One-of-a-kind humor from a one-of-a-kind human, at the 1996 MTV Movie Awards. We miss you already, Patrick Stewart. pic.twitter.com/deGPea2Lml
— MTV (@MTV) October 30, 2026
Stewart continued to heap a surprising amount of praise on the controversial show as the years went on. “In time, Beavis and Butt-Head will become defined as a very, very significant part of American culture,” Stewart wrote in a 2005 article for The Observer. “It’s brilliant. I’ve got all the tapes,” he added. For context, this was eight years after the original series had come to an end.
Patrick Stewart Once Called ‘Beavis and Butt-Head’ a Significant Part of American Culture
Then, in 2020, two years ahead of the show’s latest reboot, Stewart was asked about his Beavis and Butt-Head fandom while being interviewed for the National Post. He reportedly started off by doing a “precise imitation” of Beavis’s laugh prior to telling them, “I love that show. I’m so sorry that it’s gone.” Stewart went on to say, “I don’t know why it appealed to me, but it did. It was brilliant, that’s why. Incredible characters.”
Stewart even went as far as to call Beavis and Butt-Head “extremely highbrow.” In that same interview, he explained that he’d always had an affection for broad comedy. “I grew up loving Laurel and Hardy. In fact, my grandmother babysat Stan Laurel when he was a few months old,” Stewart revealed. “I worshipped them. And of course I loved [Charlie] Chaplin, and when I was a little older I fell in love with Danny Kaye.”
But despite lending his voice to animated sitcoms like The Simpsons, Family Guy, and American Dad!, Stewart never got a chance to work on Beavis and Butt-Head. He did, however, get to share the screen with the characters in a commercial for Paramount+:
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