The Tonight Show with Jay Leno
(air date: July 26, 2000)
Jay Leno: Alright, my next guest plays Wolverine in the huge hit movie The X-men, or X-Men. Please welcome, Hugh Jackman!
:::wild audience applause:::
(Hugh's wearing all black. Black slacks and a black T-shirt. Shakes hands with Jay and with Lorraine Bracco, from "The Sopranos")
Hugh Jackman: Hello Lorraine, pleasure meeting you.
Lorainne: Nice to meet you.
Jay: Welcome
(hear various 'I love you!' from audience)
Hugh: Yeah, guys... I think, actually one of these guys was at the front gate coming in here because when my stretch [limousine] pulled up ... thanks for the stretch by the way...
Jay: Yeah
Hugh: When my stretch pulled up the guy said Hugh Jackman here and uh, he goes Huh? and From X-Men. What? Wolverine! Oh yeah great Buddy, get him in. Wolverine Vwup up goes the gate.
Jay: (laughs) There you are.
Hugh: Exactly
Jay: Now, you're from Australia, right?
Hugh: Yeah
Jay: Where in Australia exactly?
Hugh: Um, born in Sydney.
Jay: Born in Sydney
Hugh: And um, I now live in Melbourne.
Jay: Now, do they have X-Men there? Is it huge there like it is here?
Hugh: They say it's the biggest territory in the world, per capita uh, for X-Men, yeah. But, uh, I... growing up, I didn't know about it. I knew of a rock band called The Uncanny X-Men but I had absolutely no idea...
Jay: So you weren't into it as a kid?
Hugh: No, no I wasn't. But you know it's been a huge hit down there, which is fantastic and as big as it is here. Thanks very much guys.
:::wild applause:::
Jay: So what were you into as a kid?
Hugh: What was I into uh, horror movies I think. Horror movies mainly, yeah.
Jay: Horror movies uh...
Hugh: I think I was about thirteen when I got in my first horror movie. My friend next door had a VCR, we didn't have a VCR so we used to go next door and watch I think I watched all nine Friday the 13th's including part three with 3-D glasses.
Jay: Oh, there you are.
Hugh: You seen that one?
Jay: Uh, you know I think I missed that one.
Hugh: You missed it
Jay: Uh... I think.. about number 11 I bailed ... yeah
Hugh: In fact that's why I wanted to become an actor. I'm hoping Jason Voorhees might become available one day and I can don the hockey mask and (makes slashing motions) get into 'em.
Jay: (laughs) So do you come from a big family? Lots of kids?
Hugh: Um. I'm one of six. I was brought up really in a family of five. My little sister was born when I was 11 so it was kind of a big tribe. We.. we had some adventures along the way. We used to.. My dad was a Depression baby. He born in England and believed in a nice economical holiday so ... camping was our thing.
Jay: Camping.
Hugh: Yeah, camping. My wife's thrilled about that background. As I keep saying... I got a newborn baby.. we're gonna go camping. She goes 'Great. Have a great time.' Um..
Jay: (laughing) The Cherie Netherlands. Gonna go camping at the Cherie Netherlands.
Hugh: (laughs) Exactly, so, um, yeah we used to go camping in a five man tent so that was six of us: my dad and five kids. We had some adventures... Christmas, my dad still believed in the Christmas thing so we were camping on Christmas ... it's summer in Australia of course ... and uh, and he still insisted on being Santa Claus and leaving stockings at our heads, you know, so you can imagine ... this is exactly how I actually found out Santa Claus wasn't real because when I woke up Santa was treading on my hair and I looked up and saw Santa with these dirty jockey y-fronts and looking remarkably like my dad going 'Shut up and go to sleep. Shut up, go to sleep. Santa still exists.'
Jay: (laughing)
Hugh: So that was.. yeah... (laughing)
Jay: So I'm reading your bio... and we got the set up, you know everyone's like "Wolverine, yeah Wolverine Oh yeah!".. This is pretty much your character to people.
Hugh: That's the response I get yeah.
Jay: But, I know.. I know you enjoy musical theater?
Hugh: Uh (smiling) I have been known to belt out a tune or two.
Jay: Really? Really? Now what do you do?
Hugh: Uh, I've done Beauty and the Beast, Sunset Boulevard, I've done Oklahoma!...
Jay: Oh, me too, Oklahoma! me too...
Hugh: Oklahoma, Really? (surprised) Really?
Jay: No, I'm just kidding.
Hugh: No, come on.
Jay: No, I can't sing.
Hugh: Go on...
Jay: It's funny.. I'm just picturing Wolverine going "Oooh-klahoma.." it just seems...
Hugh: It's weird ... actually, on set at Christmas, we got our first lot of ... dailies or whatever ... the were showing some cut footage to everyone at the Christmas party to keep us buoyed up, three months to go ... and there we were and we're all watching the footage and in comes Wolverine and so on and all the sudden they intercut that with me playing Curly in Oklahoma with a perm and looking like Gene Wilder...
Jay & Lorraine: (laughing)
Hugh:... and, no offense Gene but uh...
Jay: Can you give me a coupla bars from Oklahoma? I'm just ... when you see an actor...
(audience applause)
Jay: No no, you know when you see an actor...
Lorraine: (applauding with audience) Please that's great...
Jay: This is the first role I've seen you in and when you see an actor in that role it's hard to imagine them until the next role.
Hugh:...thanks for the intro (smiling)
:::sings from Oklahoma!:::
(audience goes wild)
Jay: Very good.. there you are, that's very good.
Hugh: Thank you.
Jay: Very good.
Hugh: Is there anyone...
Lorraine: Woo, fabulous. You love a guy who can sing.
Jay: She's very impressed.
Hugh: (smiling)
Lorraine: It's true, it's great.
Hugh: Is there anyone from Oklahoma here by the way?
(audience applauds)
Hugh: Because I heard ... we did the show in London and some people came from Oklahoma and when I was singing that song they would stand up and I heard later it was the state song of Oklahoma and to this day when Oklahoma is sung they're up.. right in the middle of the show so ... thanks Oklahoma.
Jay: (to audience) Is it true?
Hugh: (to audience) Yeah, is it true?
(no reaction from audience)
Jay: They're not sure. Now let me ask you this...
Hugh: (laughing)
Jay: When you're Wolverine again and you got these blades coming out of you hands...
Hugh: Yes
Jay: How does.. I mean it's an effect but how does.. I mean is it painful wearing... I mean obviously you can't scratch yourself while wearing those things...
Hugh: It wasn't so painful for me. It was kind of painful for a couple people who working with me... Uh, we had a couple accidents... I'm the kind of guy.. when I'm eating I kinda put the fork in my cheek. I'm pretty clumsy so I've got these nine inch nails and I was forced to practice with them at home and do all that but sometimes doing these scenes day after day after day and fifty setups and lots of claws and fights there were a few people who got some nasty scratches. Me included actually. There was a fight with Rebecca Romijn-Stamos where she flings this chain at me and I catch the chain...
Jay: Oh yeah, okay, okay...
Hugh: You remember it ... so, yeah, so I'm holding onto it and it's a moment where we're really staring each other down and I'm holding onto it and one of my claws goes "flick" and "tck" (he hits himself in the forehead with
his fist) straight in my head...
Jay: Ahhh...
Hugh: and I was like I think we should go again and she say I think maybe not because you got some blood trickling down right there ... as my character can heal himself...
Jay: Well I just assumed they were rubber. You mean they were actually...
Hugh: Oh, those were the real thing, Jay.
Jay: The real thing...
Hugh: Jeez, what do you think this is? The Mickey Mouse Club?
Jay: I think we're making movies here... Alright, well let's see... I think we got a clip here from X... this is the very scene you were talking about
Hugh: Funny you should mention that...
Jay: So let's take a look from X-Men this is Hugh Jackman and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos
(clip from film)
(audience applause)
Jay: What a film. Congratulations on your success and on your new baby.
Hugh: Thank you very much.
Jay: New baby and to your wife from me too. Hugh Jackman everyone. Be right back with the music of Eve 6 right after this.