Published 14:23 IST, October 12th 2020
Hugh Jackman was not director's first choice to play Wolverine?
Actor Hugh Jackman may have grown synonymous with the character of Wolverine due to his portrayal, however, he was not the director's first choice.
Hugh Jackman may have bid a farewell to his long-running on-screen portrayal of Wolverine back in 2017 with Logan, but the actor is always associated with the role long after his last appearance. Jackman's portrayal of Wolverine has to some extent monumentalised itself amid fans similar to Robert Downey Jr's Iron Man or Ryan Reynolds' Deadpool. However, The Greatest Showman Hugh Jackman was not the first preference of director Bryan Singer to cast him for the role and actor Tom Cruise indirectly assisted the actor in bagging the role. Read below to know how Hugh landed on the role of Wolverine -
How Hugh Jackman became Wolverine
Actor Dougray Scott was X-Men director Bryan Singer's first choice to play the role of Wolverine. However, back then, Scott was already committed to Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible 2. The actor was supposed to wrap up his schedule for the Tom Cruise starter action-thriller and later jump on to film the superhero film. X-Men was Fox's flagship film back in the day which made the studio to rush the production to avoid any delay.
However, Paramount, who was producing the Mission: Impossible film did not let Scott shoot both the films simultaneously. While early on the studio was blamed for not letting Scott film the X-Men film, it was revealed by the actor himself in an interview with Daily Telegraph that it was Tom Cruise who did not allow the actor to leave M: I 2 set and film the comic book movie.
Image courtesy - Still form Logan (2017) (Ben Rothstein 2017 Marvel & Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation)
Scott had revealed that Tom Cruise insisted on him staying and finishing the film before he could go on a different project. Whereas, Scott wished to film both the projects simultaneously, which according to Scott, did not sit well with Tom Cruise. Hugh Jackman was brought on board later on and he began rehearsals and action choreography for the same nearly less than a week before he was scheduled to start filming for the movie.
This won't be the only time the Tom Cruise led Mission: Impossible franchise has affected the production of other films. Back during the production of the sixth instalment in the action-thriller franchise, actor Henry Cavill was not allowed to shave off his moustache in order to reshoot his portions for Justice League, which led to the makers using CGI to remove the actor's moustache, resulting in major backlash.
Updated 14:23 IST, October 12th 2020