Hugh Jackman kicked off his concert series at Radio City Music Hall Friday night with a surprise appearance from Ryan Reynolds and a run through the songs that have made up his career, including several numbers from The Greatest Showman.
Reynolds, who co-starred with Jackman in the recent Deadpool & Wolverine, had helped announce the series in a promo video with Jackman. On Friday, he took it a step further and grabbed the microphone during Jackman’s announced “Ask Me Anything” section of the concert, starting off by saying “I was told that this was going to be a comedy version of Les Mis.”
He went on to credit Jackman’s kindness and courtesy working on their first movie together, particularly in his treatment of people on set, and called him “the best human being I know.”
“This is the first major movie star that I ever worked on with, 16 or 17 years ago on X-Men Origins: Wolverine. And I was young still. I was impressionable. I was expecting going to this movie set with this guy right here, and I didn’t know, I really didn’t know what was going to happen,” Reynolds said. “Do they just put you in rehab first and then give you a drug problem on a movie that big? How does it go? But what I saw was just about the best thing anyone could possibly experience if you’re kind of working your way up in the industry. I saw a movie star. A capital M movie star. Yeah he used to be a movie star. Now all the singing and stuff.”
The crowd at the sold-out show had already been buzzing at the appearance of Reynolds sitting in the center orchestra next to Deadpool & Wolverine director Shawn Levy, with several fans standing to catch a glimpse and asking to take photos before the show began.
The rest of Jackman’s set was punctuated by several songs from The Greatest Showman, including “The Greatest Show,” “A Million Dreams,” “The Other Side,” “From Now On” and “Come Alive,” where he was accompanied by backup singers, dancers and a live band. Jackman often joined the dances, and at one point participated in a jump rope routine that he joked should have been included in the opening of Deadpool & Wolverine, rather than Deadpool’s solo dance to *NSYNC.
He also performed “Trouble” from The Music Man, his most recent Broadway show, “Stars” and “Valjean’s Soliloquy” from Les Misérables (he starred in the movie adaptation as Jean Valjean) and a medley of Peter Allen songs from The Boy From Oz, which was Jackman’s Broadway debut.
At one point, Jackman donned a sparkly American flag vest and led the crowd in “Sweet Caroline,” which he said was in homage to his upcoming film, Song Sung Blue, in which he plays a Neil Diamond impersonator opposite Kate Hudson.
The series was originally announced as a 12-show series with about one weekend of shows per month through August. It has since been expanded to 24 performances that run across eight weekends through October.
In addition to his film career, Jackman has made regular appearances on stage, including in a 2011 solo show and as the host of the Tony Awards for multiple years.
“I hosted the Tonys here 22 years ago, and my dream was to perform here. Thank you for being here,” Jackman said on stage at Radio City Music Hall.
