Stewart Swinton

Stewart Swinton is the main antagonist of the 1994 thriller film, Wolf.

He was portrayed by James Spader.

In the Film
Will Randall is bitten by a wolf while driving home through Vermont after it was seemingly hit by his car. Soon after, he is demoted from editor-in-chief of a publishing house during a takeover by ruthless tycoon Raymond Alden, who replaces him with Will's ambitious protégé Stewart Swinton. Will begins experiencing physiological changes ranging from increased appetites and libido to hair regrowth and sharper-than-human sensory perceptions. Catching an unfamiliar scent on the clothing of his wife Charlotte, Will rushes over to Stewart's house, bites Stewart during a brief physical altercation, and rushes upstairs to the bedroom where he finds evidence of Charlotte's infidelity.



Threatening to lead a mass writers' exodus, Will successfully wrests his editor-in-chief position back from Alden, and negotiates for additional supervisory powers. Will surprises Stewart in the bathroom, notifies him of these office developments, fires him, and then urinates on Stewart's suede shoes so as to "mark his territory."



Detective Bridger visits Will's hotel room  to inform him of Charlotte's savage murder. Separately, Will and Laura both begin to harbor doubts concerning Will's possible involvement in the crime. Cutaway scenes between Stewart, Alden, and the police gradually inform the viewer that Randall's former protégé is now trying to frame Will in an attempt to get his job back. Disquieted by Will's superhuman hearing, dried mud on his shoes, and a phone call from Detective Bridger revealing that Charlotte's blood and tissue samples were contaminated by canine DNA, Laura comes to believe that Will is a murderous monster. Will voluntarily submits to being locked in the Alden horse-barn while Laura goes to the police station. There, she encounters an uncharacteristically feral Stewart, whose amber eyes and increasingly-bestial manner suggest that, having previously been bitten by Will, he has also begun the werewolf transformation, and that he killed Charlotte. Laura fends off Stewart's sexual advances and hurries back to the Alden estate, now convinced of Will's innocence and intent on leaving the country with him.



Stewart follows Laura back to her father's estate, where he surprises and kills two security guards. A brief struggle in the barn ensues. Stewart tries to rape Laura, but Will intervenes, tearing off Alezais' amulet, escaping his stable cell, and giving into the full-moon transformation. Both werewolves are brutally injured in the fight. Will eventually gains the upper hand over his opponent. Stewart tries to back stab him with a set of hedge-clippers, but Laura picks up a dead guard's revolver and shoots him dead. Will, now quite lupine, shares a wordless moment with Laura before running into the forest.



