‘Star Trek’ Photo of Patrick Stewart as Captain Picard With Hair Goes Viral

An unusual photo of Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard is making its way around the internet.

Stewart played Picard on Star Trek: The Next Generation for seven seasons and in four movies. So what makes this photo so special? The captain has hair.

Picard and Stewart are both recognizable by their completely bald heads. This look at Picard with hair has taken some Star Trek fans by surprise. Paul Haine first tweeted the photo.

“I knew that they initially tried to make Patrick Stewart wear a wig for Captain Picard but I’d never seen the test photo and now my day is complete,”

Take a look below.

As others have pointed out, this is not actually a test photo. It is a photo from Stewart in costume for a flashback scene in the episode “Violations.” The moment shows Picard and Dr. Crusher seeing the corpse of Crusher’s husband, Jack. This all takes place during a psychic assault on the Enterprise crew.

It is true that Stewart first auditioned for the role of Picard while wearing a wig. The wig was not a great fit and distracted from his performance. Luckily, he as called back in to perform without it.

Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry didn’t love the idea of Stewart playing Star Trek’s new captain.

“Gene and I did not have a close relationship,” Stewart recalled at a convention. “We had a respectful relationship. Gene had very strongly felt that I was wrong for the role. I am told, and I don’t know the details, but there was a lot of warfare that went on in the producers’ offices about that.

“I was invited up to Gene’s house one morning after I had been seen by [producer] Robert Justman on the stage at Royce Hall in UCLA,” Stewart said. “Justman discovered me. Apparently – and his wife claimed this was true – at some point during this scholarly, academic evening he turned to his wife and said ‘we found the captain.’ Gene saw me the next morning and profoundly disagreed.”

Stewart did get the role and he feels that Roddenberry came around, more or less.

“I got the feeling that he was ultimately kind of satisfied with how it turned out,” Stewart said.