PATRICK Stewart is now a household name, but when he first signed up to captain the crew of the Enterprise in Star Trek the Next Generation, he didn't think he would boldy go very far.

In fact, he was so convinced he was going to be fired, he didn't unpack his bags for six weeks.

"I was very surprised to be offered the part. Although I felt I could play the captain of a starship I didn't think they would feel I was the right person for the part. There was quite a lot of opposition to me taking the role," he said.

But 178 episodes of the phenomenally successful TV series and four spin-off blockbuster films later, who's laughing now?

"I am extremely grateful for the opportunity of doing Star Trek. It has been almost entirely for the good. It made me a commercially viable actor and gave me a world-wide reputation because Star Trek is aired in 130 countries," said Stewart.

"There have been some downsides. Not in theatre, but for television parts or films where the director or producer has thought I was too closely identified with Jean Luc Picard.

"But if it wasn't for Star Trek I probably wouldn't be doing this play."

The play he refers to is Henrik Ibsen's The Master Builder, in which Stewart will be starring at Malvern Theatres.

Stewart plays Master Builder Solness, a man trapped in a sterile marriage whose ambition and lust are suddenly reawakened when the young and beautiful Hilde mysteriously arrives in town.

Stewart stars opposite Sue Johnston, famous for her roles in TV series The Royle Family and Goodbye Cruel World.

Ibsen is a world away from intergalactic exploration, but fittingly, the project started in a suitably alien atmosphere.

"My involvement in this came about just over a year ago, when I was on the set of Star Trek - Nemesis," said Stewart.

"I was chatting to the screen writer John Logan, who is very successful, having written the likes of Any Given Sunday and Gladiator.

"He asked had I ever thought of doing a film based on The Master Builder. I said I hadn't thought of the play for over a decade but I would give it some thought.

"When I was back in London, I was talking to Duncan Weldon, with whom I had been looking for a play for a long, long time, and I asked: 'How do you feel about The Master Builder?' "

From there it was a case of contacting Logan for a script rather than a screenplay and finding a time slot for Stewart, who was already contracted to return to the part of Profesor Charles Xavier in X-Men 2.

The Master Builder forms part of the high profile productions of Ibsen plays sweeping the country, including Brand, currently at Stratford and moving to the West End with Ralph Fiennes.

"I don't think Ibsen ever went out of fashion. I find playing Solness is not immensely difficult. I think Ralph has the most challenging role," said Stewart.

Although Stewart is a celebrated stage actor, he does have the unusual position of being on stage while appearing on the silver screen at cinemas down the road - or, in Malvern's case, across the hall - in X Men 2, the first big blockbuster of the summer.

"I am charmed by the prospect," he said.

"I consider myself extremely fortunate to have the opportunity to work in these different fields.

"It took five-and-a-half months to shoot

X Men 2 and I was involved from the second day until the last day of filming. But I don't think there was a shot or a take which lasted more than two minutes."

So the stage provides Stewart with the chance to avoid the fragmented work and do something more flowing and natural.

"I became an actor to work on stage and everything else is a happy accident I certainly didn't plan for," he said.

n The Master Builder runs at Malvern Theatres from May 15 to 24. Tickets are £14 to £24, students £8, from the box office on 01684 892277.