HUGH JACKMAN IN CONCERT (Mirvish Productions). At the Princess of Wales Theatre (300 King West). To July 17, Tuesday-Saturday 8 pm, matinees Saturday and Sunday 2 pm. $49-$130. 416-872-1212. See listing. Rating: NNN
If you just know actor Hugh Jackman from his role in X-Men and other films, you’ll find a different man onstage at the Princess of Wales: the singer-dancer who’s starred in musicals in New York and London and won a Tony for his portrayal of singer-songwriter Peter Allen in The Boy From Oz.
You’ll get a taste of that last production in Jackman’s current show, bringing a 16-year-old dream to life when Jackman had time on his hands between films. (Read an interview with Jackman here.)
It’s done as a nightclub sort of presentation, Jackman working with an 18-piece orchestra and a couple of backup performers.
He’s a real charmer, no question, who clearly loves what he’s doing onstage and sharing that love with the audience. Whether he’s singing a pop song or digging into musical theatre treasures from Oklahoma or Carousel, he gives his heart to viewers and often talks directly to them. There’s no sense of feigned patter he really cares that the audience is there.
Jackman has a pleasant voice, though at the first performance it took him a few minutes to power it up. He begins with Oh, What A Beautiful Morning from Oklahoma, starting it offstage as it’s done in the musical, and maybe opening night nerves made him a little tentative. But he soon warmed up, his comedy proving as genial as his singing and dancing.
The audience eats it up, especially when he provides some hip-wiggling, booty-shaking moves or a button threatened to pop off his shirt. For many, the less clothing, the better.
Some of the show’s best numbers are pastiches, one a section that draws on songs with dances in their titles, the other a run through such 20th Century Fox musicals as Singin’ In The Rain and Guys And Dolls.
Another is a surprising song choice that serves as homage to his native Australia, a number for which he’s joined by several aboriginal performers and his young son.
Singing to his wife (who was in the audience), showing family photos and sharing family stories, recalling phone calls that landed him jobs or kicking himself for gigs to which he said no, Jackman knows how to hold an audience with his energy and warmth. He even delivers all eight a cappella parts in the challenging, patter-based opening number from The Music Man, a show he performed in high school.
It’s all entertaining, for sure, but the show still feels like it’s in development. It would work better in a smaller house, for one, and the two back-up performers are largely anonymous, doing little more than give Jackman a chance to change costumes.
But if you want to see an appealing performer, vivacious smile and all, you can’t do better than Hugh Jackman.
