Xavier St. Cloud
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| Highlander character | |
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| Alias | Gerard Fleurie, Nelson Mfume |
| Age | 834 (at time of death) |
| Found | 1160, Morocco[1] |
| Mentors | Henri St. Cloud[1] |
| Pupils | Morgan D'Estaing |
| Portrayed by | Roland Gift |
| First appearance | For Tomorrow We Die |
| Seasons | 1, 2, 3, 4 |
Xavier St. Cloud is a fictional character from Highlander: The Series, portrayed by actor Roland Gift. He is an Immortal.
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[edit] Appearances
St. Cloud is first introduced in "For Tomorrow We Die" (1993), the fifteenth episode of season one, as a thief who uses poison gas to rob a jewelry store and kill his own accomplice in the process. He then confesses his crime to the immortal priest Darius as a provocation against Darius' firm pacifistic beliefs. St. Cloud tells him, "Here I am humiliating one of the world's greatest warriors. And what does he do... nothing. God -- I love religion. (...) I've been a very bad boy. I've killed six people [for] money. There's never enough. Looks like I'm gonna have to do it all over again. (...) Who needs a soul ?"[2] When Duncan MacLeod discovers this, he remembers how he met St. Cloud in 1917 near Soissons, France. St. Cloud had used mustard gas to steal the soldiers' wages. MacLeod and his mortal comrade Stan had died, but MacLeod had revived and nearly got beheaded by St. Cloud. Back in the present, St. Cloud charmingly asks MacLeod's girlfriend Tessa Noël to include one of his Fante sculptures in the exposition she is preparing. Darius recalls for MacLeod, "Long ago I found [St. Cloud] hiding from the police in my church. He was a petty thief then. They would have guillotined him for stealing a piece of jewelry. (...) Later I had news of him, robbing, murdering-- He was sentenced to life, but he escaped. (...) He fled to West Africa and lived there like a king - He must have spent his fortune... and now he's here in Paris to collect more."[2] St. Cloud meets them in the chapel's garden, on holy ground and says, "Holy ground's a wonderful thing. It allows us to speak almost as friends. (...) I enjoy the company of my own kind. (...) I find humans limited. (...) They all die anyway."[2] St. Cloud delivers the Fante sculpture to Tessa and plants a bomb inside. MacLeod disarms the bomb and faces St. Cloud. St. Cloud loses his left hand in the fight and escapes.
In "Unholy Alliance, Part I" (1994), St. Cloud uses mercenaries to kill Immortals first so that he can behead them. Duncan MacLeod and Charlie DeSalvo barely escape his attack. St. Cloud turns out to be allied with renegade Watcher James Horton. MacLeod eventually finds St. Cloud's hiding and fights him, but Charlie is shot by Horton. Charlie barely survives, and MacLeod sets out to find his enemies.
[edit] History
Xavier would become a great fighter and powerful Immortal, but also turned into an assassin and, later, a thief and murderer. Xavier was a hedonist who would do anything to become rich, even if it meant killing to make a profit. According to Xavier, mortals were beneath consideration and so killing them meant nothing to him.
In 1653, he traveled across the deserts of the Middle East as an assassin. In Algiers he challenged Hamza el Kahir, an Immortal Arab who he had encountered before. Hamza was having a drink with his friend and fellow Immortal Duncan MacLeod. MacLeod would prove in the future to be Xavier's greatest adversary, but at the time, being only a young Immortal, Xavier didn't take much interest in him, focusing instead on Hamza. Hamza, knowing he wouldn't stand a chance of surviving the battle, instead decided to escape. MacLeod, however, refused to back down from a challenge and decided to face Xavier at the scheduled hour. To Duncan's challenge, Xavier simply responded: "I don't sleep with virgins, and I don't kill children." (This claim is suspect, as Xavier never showed any qualms about killing anyone, but it might also have explained why he would later accept at least one pupil.) However, when continuously taunted by MacLeod, Xavier decided to fight him. At the last minute, Hamza came to fight Xavier, sacrificing himself to prevent Duncan from dying. The two fought and Xavier beheaded Hamza in front of MacLeod.
In 1803, during the Napoleonic Wars, Xavier was riding his horse by a chateau outside Paris which belonged to the D'Estaing family, when he sensed an Immortal. He discovered newly Immortal, Morgan D'Estaing, who had been mortally stabbed by his adopted father, Philippe D'Estaing. The property's inheritance had been denied to him for being adopted so he had tried to kill his younger brother, who would inherit all. For that, he paid with his mortal life. Morgan wanted revenge, but Xavier told him to be patient and that he would get his revenge soon. Xavier then took Morgan as his pupil. Three years later, Xavier and Morgan returned to the D'Estaing chateau as it was about to be taken over by the British due to France's defeat. Philippe D'Estaing and his family were shocked to see Morgan alive. Morgan wanted to slit their throats but Xavier came walking in and told Morgan not to. Xavier forced Philippe to tell them where the money and jewelry were, making a promise he wouldn't kill anyone and then suggesting that they have a drink. As they left, Morgan wasn't happy that his family was alive, but Xavier told him that they wouldn't be soon. Morgan realized that Xavier had poisoned the wine. As they left the estate, the British army entered the property, and Xavier and Morgan sensed Duncan MacLeod, who was in the British army. Duncan remembered Xavier from their last encounter but Xavier and Morgan left since they weren't alone.
Using poisonous gases in heists became a habit for Xavier, who used this method in 1977 in West Africa to kill a drug lord and steal all his valuable objects and his money.
Duncan followed Xavier and Horton to Paris. Duncan found out where they were going with the help of CID agent Renee Delaney, who was investigating Legris and Talbott's murders. With Renee's and Joe Dawson's help, Horton was supposedly killed, but Xavier escaped. Duncan then went alone to Xavier's house, where he fought and finally beheaded his long time nemesis with Xavier's own blade.
[edit] Characterization
The Watcher Chronicles say that "Early in his Immortal life, probably around the same time he whacked his first teacher and took both the man's head and his name, Xavier St. Cloud realized that the road to success was paved with dirty tricks. In his early days, Xavier would choose his victims with care, studying them, never challenging one that might be better than he."[1] The Chronicle further says, "Later, Xavier experimented with poison gas and other dishonorable methods to incapacitate his victims before taking their heads. After MacLeod took Xavier's hand in 1992, Xavier even resorted to mercenaries with Uzis-- no class. Xavier may have had a polished demeanor - well-dressed, well-read, well-spoken, as well as a weakness for expensive caviar and rare art-- but inside beat the heart of a coward."[1] The Chronicle dated 1917 adds, "St. Cloud is proving more deadly to our troops than even the biggest bloody guns the Kaiser can muster. (...) The blighter doesn't care how many mortals he kills, he just wants the money."[3]
[edit] Concept
The script of "For Tomorrow We Die" describes St. Cloud as "strikingly handsome - early 30s. Cosmopolitan, expensively dressed, impeccably manicured."[4] Executive Producer Bill Panzer says of St. Cloud that he is "one of our great bad guys, hedonistic, nasty, cruel, greedy, vindictive. We'd liked him so much that we brought him back for another show."[5] Creative Consultant David Abramowitz says, ""Unholy Alliance Part I" is an episode that I liked a lot. It was a strong action/adventure episode and brought back to us the character of Xavier St. Cloud, with one hand, which is interesting because it posed a number of questions for us, as to whether a hand regenerates, and we had decided that it didn't, even for Immortals, that they could heal, but they couldn't regenerate (...) In truth, we the writers sat around the room for hours, talking about, 'Could we do this ?', 'Could we not do this ?', and finally we decided to go for it."[6]
[edit] References
- ^ a b c d Episode "For Tomorrow We Die", Bonus Material, Watcher Chronicles, Article "Xavier St. Cloud", in Highlander: The Series (season 1) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, Inc., 2001), disk 5.
- ^ a b c Episode "For Tomorrow We Die", in Highlander: The Series (season 1) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, Inc., 2001), disk 5.
- ^ Episode "For Tomorrow We Die", Bonus Material, Watcher Chronicles, Article "Duncan MacLeod 1917", in Highlander: The Series (season 1) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, Inc., 2001), disk 5.
- ^ Episode "For Tomorrow We Die", Final Shooting script, p.1, in Highlander: The Series (season 1) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, 2001), disk 9.
- ^ Episode "For Tomorrow We Die", Bonus Material, Bill Panzer's interview, in Highlander: The Series (season 1) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, 2001), disk 5.
- ^ Episode "Unholy Alliance, Part I", Bonus Material, David Abramowitz's interview, in Highlander: The Series (season 2) (DVD, Davis-Panzer Productions, 2003), disk 5.
[edit] External links
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