Hugh Jackman Prays Before Performances: 'Allow Me to Surrender'
When he steps onstage to perform in the play "Broadway to Oz" in Australia this month, Golden Globe Award-winning actor Hugh Jackman plans to surrender his performances to God.
"Before I go onstage every night, I pause and dedicate the performance to God, in the sense of 'allow me to surrender.' When you allow yourself to surrender to the story, to the character, to the night, to the audience, transcendence happens," Jackman revealed to Parade magazine during an October interview. "... When that happens, there is nothing like it on the planet. It's the moment people experience when they fall in love, which is equally frightening and exciting. That's what it feels like."
The 47-year-old actor, who rose to international fame as Wolverine in the "X-Men" franchise, likens his relationship with God to that of Christian runner Eric Liddell in the film "Chariots of Fire." While Lidell's sport helped him connect to God, Jackman believes his live performances do the same.
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"I'm a religious person. This is going to sound weird to you. In "Chariots of Fire" the runner Eric Liddell says, 'When I run, I feel His pleasure,'" he told Parade. "And I feel that pleasure when I act and it's going well, particularly onstage. I feel what everyone's searching for, the feeling that unites us all."
Jackman said he knew he wanted to be an actor after having a spiritual encounter at the age of 13.
"I'm a Christian. I was brought up very religious," he said. "I used to go to different evangelists' [revival] tents all the time. When I was about 13, I had a weird premonition that I was going to be onstage, like the preachers I saw."
In a 2010 interview with GQ Magazine, Jackman recalled his father motivating him in high school to strengthen his faith.
"I think it was during my high school years. Although I don't remember a specific moment, I certainly remember my father brought us up to believe a spiritual life was the only life to be had," the actor told GQ. "During high school is when being taught that and thinking it for myself came together."
Five years ago it seems Jackman adopted a broader vision concerning faith.
"I'm a little broader in my thinking. ... Some people may think I've gone off track, I'm not sure. But for me, if you put Christ, Buddha and a few other people at a table together, I don't think they'd be arguing," Jackman previously told GQ. "I think there's an essential truth to most of those [religions] and that's probably what I believe in now. Ultimately, it's the idea that we are much more unified than we are separate, and that includes the religions we've created around the world — there is an essential truth there."
Even though the thespian was not identifying himself as a Christian in the 2010 interview, he was not opposed to it.
"My father is still a committed Christian," he previously told GQ. "I don't have any arguments with anything I interpret from that faith."
