Hugh Jackman: From Broadway king to Hollywood action hero, and back again

EIGHT years ago he took New York by storm as the boy from Oz. Now it's the bloke from Wahroonga who has Broadway abuzz.

Hugh Jackman

EIGHT years ago he took New York by storm as the boy from Oz. Now it's the bloke from Wahroonga who has Broadway abuzz.

As Hugh Jackman, the kid from Sydney's north shore who conquered Hollywood, continues to break box-office records with his one-man stage show, Manhattan's big-ticket productions must be wondering what they're doing wrong.

But if critics are anything to go by, it's what the affable Jackman is doing right that has seen Back on Broadway, his all-singing, all-dancing, (some-talking) revue, take a record $US1.47 million ($1.48m) last week to sit third on Broadway's weekly box office list.

According to the Broadway League, Jackman's show has broken the Broadhurst Theatre box-office record for the fourth time, surpassing the $US1.46m record from the previous week. The takings were not far behind the week's two biggest grossers The Lion King ($US2.08m) and Spider-Man ($2.07m).

Jackman's 10-week show - his first appearance on Broadway since his Tony award-winning performance in The Boy from Oz in 2003 - features the 43-year-old with an 18-piece orchestra, with which he performs songs and stories that signpost his long and varied film and stage career.

With sold-out shows, audiences - and, it seems, critics - can't get enough. Ben Brantley in The New York Times gushed about the "impossibly talented" Australian: "He is, in his gold lame way, as perfect a gentleman as anyone your grandmother swooned over at the Roxy. You half expect him to send you (and everyone else in the theatre) flowers the next day."

The New York Post's Elisabeth Vincentelli was similarly effusive ("Watching Jackman bite into his numbers with gleeful gusto is a thrill . . . there's a new king on Broadway"), while Variety said Jackman was "simply magical".

But while there seems little doubt about Jackman's talent and star quality, not everyone is convinced the one-man show is really the third biggest production in town. Writing in The New York Times, Patrick Healy says despite Back on Broadway sitting at No 3, the figures do not denote ticket prices and as such are unrepresentative. "The theatre is selling tickets for up to $350 apiece," Healy wrote. "That's double the top face value of $175 for orchestra seats for that production."

He says theatre producers are increasing seat prices on a "day-to-day, even hour-by-hour basis", depending on the supply and demand and the bankability of the star. With tickets ranging between $US76 and $US350, the show has an average entry price of $US136.85. The average for The Lion King is $US114.

Still, Jackman, who started his stage career as Joe Gillis in a 1996 Melbourne production of Sunset Boulevard, is not complaining.

He's the king of Broadway. At least until January 1, when he steps off stage, returns to Australia and firmly plants the feet that New York worships.