IMOGEN: Welcome back! THE GREATEST SHOWMAN, the Hugh Jackman-led movie musical about circus
pioneer P.T. Barnum, will hit movie theaters just in time for Christmas. I sat down with
Jackman as well as stars Zac Efron, Zendaya, Keala Settle and award-winning songwriters
Benj Pasek and Justin Paul ahead of the release to discuss bringing Jackman’s longtime passion
project to the big screen. [Applause]
[Music]
--This is obviously a massive passion
project for you. What was it about PT Barnum that made use of determined to
bring him to the big screen?
--For me musicals really often work best when you
have a larger than life characters you have a story that involves a lot of
themes of imagination, of dream. You're in the world of showbiz. It felt like
perfect kind of character.
---PT Barnum was an innovator. He was ahead of his time he
was the Steve Jobs of his time, the Jay-Z of his time,
you know these impresarios.
--The world of PT Barnum the oddities. Well it was the
1800s, it was a very tough way of living back then. There was a lot that would
bring people down and he wanted to create entertainment, not that was
exclusive, but was for the masses. And he did so by putting together this group of
oddities and I'm sure he started off by doing it just to make money, but as time
went on he realized that he didn't just take these people who were invisible to
society and put them into the spotlight and turn them into stars, but he actually
made them feel loved for the first time in their lives.
--And I love the theme in
this of what he did back then with his show, of including people, of bringing
people out of the shadows, of celebrating difference, was something I thought
really would speak to now.
--So what did you love about playing your characters
who are in love.
--It's I mean it's just fun. It's fun, it's like it's I mean what's
better than playing like star-crossed forbidden love
--In a musical. -- It's kind of
the pinnacle of all feelings.
--Talk to me about your Odyssey. I mean taking what taking on an
iconic role.
--[laughs] I know, it's crazy! It was and still is. It's kind of
something that I still look back on like it was a thousand years ago, but it feels
like it. Yeah that I didn't do. It just I got out of the way and this character
came alive, and and something in me had to sort of step up to the plate to carry
it and be that vessel for it. And I learned a lot about myself in the
process, and the only way that I could do that,
I kid you not, had it not been for all the time
and the grateful opportunities I've had on Broadway, there's no way I would have
gotten through this film at all. There was so much discipline involved, so much
determination that had to be filtered through that character, and that came
from Broadway.
--We rehearsed this very much like a Broadway show. I mean, we got
every number down to where we didn't want to waste any film. We want to nail
it first take on the day as if we could run it through as a Broadway production.
We never got quite there, but we got as close as we could.
["The Greatest Show" from The Greatest Showman plays]
[Music] --The idea that Hugh Jackman would ever
sing a song of ours was like crazy, and we remember being in the studio with him
for the very first time, meeting him there, and hearing him sing, and we were
trying to like not lose our cool but we would we would be like Okay Hugh can
we try it again? And then like privately freaking out that he was he was singing.
He's such an incredible, as you know, song and dance man, he really is the song and
dance men of our time. And and getting to see him interpret our work is is
incredible.
--You fall in love with the musical because of the music. You
love because of that. The music is amazing. You can listen to it over and
over again and I also think the story is something that many people who love
theatre are gonna relate to. The whole I want to run away and join the circus, if
you have that at all in your blood, you're gonna see this movie and
literally run and go and join the circus, or whatever the circus is.
--Please come
back to Broadway soon! --I will come back to Broadway soon.
--Do you promise to do a musical this time? --That's
what I'm working on right now.
--You ready? --We're ready.
The Greatest Showman opens in theaters nationwide on December the 20th.