Patrick Stewart recites Shakespeare

BEVERLY HILLS (AP) — Patrick Stewart was so inspired by the inventors and inventions being honored by the motion picture academy Saturday night that he offered a spontaneous recitation of a scene from Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

The venerable actor hosted the academy’s annual Scientific and Technical Awards ceremony, an untelevised dinner at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, and he closed the evening by going off-script with Puck’s plea in defense of art.

Stewart was a gamely host throughout the more than three-hour program, calling the honorees “film magicians” and poking fun at his own lack of hightech understanding.

“I have to tell you, I wouldn’t know the difference between a warp-core breach and a space-time continuum if they got into bed with me!” the 77-yearold actor said to raucous applause.

Stewart presented nine awards for hardware and software innovations, along with three Oscar statuettes.

Two of the Oscars went to the creator and developer of the Houdini visual effects and animation system, a collection of tools for computer-generated effects that has been used in more than 600 feature films. Mark Elendt and Side Effects Software each accepted an Oscar for their 25 years of work on the program. Four other Houdini collaborators received an academy plaque.

The third Oscar was the Gordon E. Sawyer Award, which recognizes extraordinary technological contributions to the film industry. Jonathan Erland became the 26th recipient to date for his decades of study, innovation and advocacy for the science of movies. Erland was a founder of the academy’s visual effects branch, co-founder of the Visual Effects Society and counts the original “Star Wars” and “Star Trek” among his film credits.