Hugh Jackman looks back on 17 years of Wolverine, role he never expected but which has defined his career until now
Australian actor whose friends had him playing James Bond, not a dark, brooding anti-hero, says thought of moving on from his X-Men role, and the unpredictability it brings, energises him
When Hugh Jackman graduated from drama school in Australia, he remembers having friends who were willing to bet money that he’d eventually be James Bond on the big screen. But that he’d play a comic-book tough guy who chomps cigars and sinks his claws into bad guys’ faces? Not so much.
Jackman is the first to admit that Wolverine wasn’t “a bread-and-butter role for me. No one was saying, ‘You’re definitely going to play a dark, brooding sort of anti-hero.’”
The 48-year-old actor laughs at the memory, yet the character, with his recalcitrant attitude and penchant for ultra-violence, has for 17 years fascinated mainstream pop culture, adoring fanboys and even Jackman himself.
He’s played Wolverine in nine movies, starting with 2000’s X-Men, be it as a star or in a cameo, but he’s putting the mutton chops and claws away after one last stand in Logan (in cinemas now), the finishing touch on a memorable run.
What sticks out most for Jackman over that time? So many weights lifted and so many chickens eaten getting pumped up to be a superhero icon. The day Jackman got the role in 1999 – when Dougray Scott couldn’t make it work around Mission: Impossible II. Sitting on a New York fire escape with his wife Deborra-Lee Furness the Saturday night after X-Men opened in 2000 and her saying: “I think this is going to change everything.”