Hugh Jackman Young: Get to Know the Man Behind the Claws

There's a lot to Hugh Jackman, including the fact that he's charming, incredibly handsome, oh-so-talented, can sing and dance his way across the Broadway stage and really has a way of slicing up those bad guys with those claws of his.

He's been doing all of it since he stepped foot in Hollywood, and there's a lot to know about the Australian hunk, from how he rose to fame to his feelings about reprising his most famous role in this month's Deadpool & Wolvervine .

Hugh Jackman young

Born on October 12, 1968 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Jackman began acting at age 26, appearing in one episode of the Australian TV show Law of the Land (1994). Right after that, he scored his first ever starring role in the miniseries Correlli , running for 10 episodes in 1995 and only aired in Australia.

The actor would go on to work on six other projects before hitting the Hollywood screen, with the most notable one being the United Kingdom TV movie adaptation of Oklahoma! (1999).

Hugh Jackman young in the original X-Men

Jackman's first ever American film was a pretty big one: The initial X-Men movie, which was released in 2000. He played Logan/Wolverine and worked alongside Patrick Stewart , Ian McKellen , James Marsden and Halle Berry .

The actor would go on to play this character six more times between 2003 and 2014 before deciding to take the ultimate break from his status as a superhero: Wolverine died at the conclusion of 2017's Logan .

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The beginning of his musical career

Even though Jackman might not have been wearing his Wolverine claws, his career was always super sharp. In between X-Men films, he worked on movies like Someone Like You (2001), Van Helsing , The Prestige (2006), Flushed Away (2006), Happy Fee t (2006) and Deception (2008).

Then, in 2012, the actor landed the role of Jean Valjean in the film version of Broadway's Les Misérables. However, getting there wasn't easy, because Jackman had to delay the shooting of Wolverine (2013) in order to star in it.

"Sometimes people will thank their agents in a perfunctory way, but this one wouldn’t have happened without them. It just wouldn’t have," Jackman explained. " You know how big the Wolverine train can be , so that took a lot of maneuvering."

He added onto that, saying "I’m thrilled with the way it worked out. I had waited a long time to do a movie musical, so when this one came up, I was, like, ‘Oh, I hadn’t even thought of that one!' I don’t really know why, but I suppose it had just been around for so long that no one had ever talked about the possibility."

Jackman would go on to earn an Oscar nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for his work in Les Misérables .

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Hugh Jackman young in The Greatest Showman

In 2017, he officially decided to hang up his claws and go for the chorus. And the perfect film for him to do that in? The Greatest Showman — a musical inspired by the real life story of ringmaster P.T Barnum.

"He [Barnum] created this world that no one had even thought possible ," Jackman explained. “He really, for me, epitomized the idea that your imagination is your limit in a time where things were very rigid and when the social position you were born into was the one you were stuck in.”

His portrayal of P.T Barnum earned him a Golden Globe nomination in the category of Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy.

The actor's most recent work

Leaving the circus life behind him, Jackman worked on projects like The Front Runner (2018), Free Guy (2021), Reminiscence (2021), Human Resources (2022-2023) and Faraway Downs (2023).

That was his final project before the change-in-heart (and long-awaited) return of Wolverine.

Hugh Jackman in Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)

Marvel fans all over the world were thrilled to hear that Jackman would be teaming up with Ryan Reynolds in the latest Deadpool film, despite saying that he would never return to the role of Wolverine.

“I was on my way, I was just driving, and literally, just like a bolt of lightning, came this knowing deep in my gut that I wanted to do this film with Ryan [Reynolds],” Jackman said. “When I said I was done [playing Wolverine], I really thought I was done. But in the back of my head, ever since I saw Deadpool 1 , I was, like, ‘Those two characters together.’ I knew it, I knew the fans wanted it. Ever since I put on the claws, people talked about these two. So, that had always been there.”

“[So] I rang Ryan and I just said, ‘Let’s do it.’. I hadn’t rung my agent , no one. I had to ring my agent and said, ‘Oh, by the way, I have just committed to a movie.’”

Putting the claws back on hasn't been easy, though. According to Jackman, “When I came back to it, it was really fun and I was thrilled. My body was a little sore at the beginning, but I was thrilled that my body was still responding. And I realized how good it is for your brain. But the hardest bit … the food. I have to eat a lot. For me, for my body type, I'm naturally skinny. To get the size on, that's the hardest bit. That's the bit that does my head in.”

Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) is directed by Stranger Things superstar Shawn Levy , and is set to hit theaters on July 26, 2024.

The personal life of Hugh Jackman

Jackman was married to Deborra-Lee Furness from 1996 to 2023. During that time, they had two children together. The actor has also been open and honest about his furry friends , and often includes them in family updates.