Patrick Stewart was mistakenly "outed" by a newspaper as gay... and he was a charmer about it, even in his denials!

It all started in an article released by The Guardian newspaper in Britain. The article discussed how certain actors in Hollywood have difficulty "coming out" as gay, even in this more progressive society. As an example, they cited Ellen Page, who recently confirmed that she was, indeed, a lesbian, after years of rumors swirling around her sexuality.

When the paper saw that Patrick sent a nice tweet to Page congratulating her for "coming out," they took it to mean that he, himself, was gay, and wrote the following sentence: "Some gay people, such as Sir Patrick Stewart, think Page's coming out speech is newsworthy because a high-profile and surprisingly politically aware young actress has decided not to play by the rules that so many closeted Hollywood actors are advised to follow if they are to enjoy mainstream success."

It seemed to have slipped their minds that Patrick recently got married... to a lady!

Nevertheless, even though Patrick's best friend, Sir Ian McKellen, is gay, Patrick is not, and he took to Twitter to clear everything up with an adorable tweet: "But @guardian I have, like, five or even SEVEN hetero friends and we totally drink beer and eat lots of chicken wings! Well, @guardian it makes for a nice change...at least I didn't wake up to the internet telling me I was dead again."

Since then, the Guardian has corrected the article, claiming that they meant to say "some people" and not "some gay people." Still, we have to commend Patrick for his comments -- it was a classy, witty response from a classy, witty guy. Many celebrities (looking at you, Tom Cruise) -- hell, many people -- could stand to take a lesson from Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Ultimately, the true measure of a man lies not in who he sleeps with, but how he behaves in the face of adversity... and Stewart measured up quite nicely!