Retroman said:
http://www.parade.com
http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2006/edition_05-14-2006/AHugh_Jackman
Onstage and at home,
X-Men star Hugh Jackman lives by this credo:
Say Yes to What Scares You
By James Kaplan
Published: May 14, 2006
Ive always felt that if you back down from a fear, the ghost of that fear never goes away, Hugh Jackman says. It diminishes people. So Ive always said yes to the thing Im most scared about.
Seven years ago, Jackman was an ambitious yet virtually unknown actor whose biggest credit was a London stage revival of
Oklahoma! Suddenly, at 31, he was offered the leading role of Wolverine in
X-Men. His wife, actress Deborra-Lee Furness, counseled strongly against the move, worried hed be typecast as a comic-book hero. The first thing in this script is that claws come out of your hands? she asked. What is that?
Jackman had no ideabut he took the job. The first two
X-Men films earned more than $700 million in worldwide box-office receipts. The newest,
X-Men: The Last Stand, opens May 26. Now Jackman, a native Australian, finds himself in command of a franchise and triumphant in a broad range of stage and screen roles. He already has completed five movies set to open this year, ranging from romantic comedy to sci-fi drama.
I stood back about a week ago, and I was like, Wow! Im pretty much where I had hoped to be, Jackman says. He looks happy as he says itand is even more delighted a moment later, when I ask if his family (his wife, 6-year-old son, Oscar, and 10-month-old daughter, Ava) is in Los Angeles with him. Theyre always with me, he says, beaming.
He seems strengthened by their presence. A tall, lean, almost absurdly handsome man, Jackman has hazel eyes set off by a green T-shirt and brown leather motorcycle jacket. His long, blue-jeaned legs are folded under the table. He appears utterly comfortable in his skin, entirely lacking the sense of vanity and prickly self-importance that male movie stars so often carry.
Jackman can portray brooding machismo with ease, but he doesnt back down from a challenge: He won a Tony Award in 2004 for his uninhibited portrayal of the late Peter Allen, a maracas-shaking, puffy-shirt-wearing, gay Broadway icon. Strikingly open and undefensive, Jackman exudes that rarest of qualities: genuine sunniness.
I do believe that people bring into this world and I have two children, so I can see ita certain demeanor, a certain basic nature in terms of their approach to life, he tells me. From everything Ive heard from my family, I think I was one of those kids who came in pretty happy to be here.
Yet Jackman understands how precarious happiness can be. When he was 8, his mother left her husband and children and moved halfway around the worldback to her native England. Jackmans father, a hardworking accountant, did his best to bring up five kids by himself.
My mother was not well, Jackman says. She probably was suffering from postpartum depression. It may not have been diagnosed. Im not sure. But she was going through a tough time. I spent my first 18 months with my godparents.
The period after his mother left is seared in his memory: He and his next older brother fought like cats and dogs, Jackman recalls. It was really miserable for a while. Dad was not home till 6:30 or 7 at night, so lots of stuff would happen. We were sort of fending for ourselves. And Dad was just so stretched, often. Youd get in trouble for something you shouldnt be in trouble for. My brother would hit me, and Id start crying, and Dad would say, Stop crying, the pair of you. Stop crying.
Outside the home, I felt very exposed, Jackman says. Divorce was around, obviously, but no ones mother left. It was always the father, and he lived around the corner and came on weekends. I remember I just wanted to be normal. Of course I wanted my mom back, and for a long time I thought she was coming back. When I was 12, they tried to reconcile, which was short-lived. When it seemed as though his parents might get back together, he says, I remember that feeling of, I knew it, I knew it. When that fell apart, I was very angry.
The teachers at his all-boys private school took pity on him: Maybe a little extra bit of slack was given to me because his mother left, Jackman says, laughing at the memory of perhaps having overplayed the sympathy card just a bit.
In athletics, he turned his anger to his advantage. I think I am incredibly determined, says Jackman. Playing rugby when I was young, if I got tackled very hard, I would kind of go into a little white rage. I dont know where that came from. Maybe being the youngest, maybe being bullied a bit, or whatever.
The determination remains, but the anger has dissipated. Jackman now has, he maintains, a great relationship with his mother, whose open, slightly mercurial nature he identifies with. In fact, I never felt angry at her, and I cant explain to you why. Ive had many acting teachers who were like, There are demons in there! Pull them out! I spent a long time thinking, Right, yeah
But theyre obviously not there.
In the first weeks of shooting the original
X-Men, director Bryan Singer worried that he had on his hands a Wolverine who was a bit
light. He pulled me aside and said, Theres stuff we saw in the auditionstuff we know that you have that youre not bringing. Youve just got to get out there and start doing it, Jackman recalls.
I was upset with myself. Upset that I had done four weeks of work, and I hadnt really gone for it. It sort of went against everything I thought I was about. So I went in the next day and pretty much ad-libbed my entire scene.
The director loved it, adds Jackman. Thats the role. Wolverine is his own man.
As is the man who plays him. The fear of letting myself downof saying no to something that I was afraid of and then sitting in my room later going, I wish Id had the guts to say this or thatthat galvanizes me more than anything, Hugh Jackman says. Sunnily.
