Hugh Jackman

Hugh: (joking that George Clooney wasn't too please with him nabbing the People's Sexiest Man Alive crown from him) George Clooney rang me at two in the morning ... I was half asleep and I said to him, 'Ah, George sweetie, good to hear from you.' ... He goes, "Shut up, Jackman!' ... [He said,] 'I know what you did! You started this big campaign that's been going on and [you] took the title away from me.' I thought that was unnecessary.

Hugh: (on wearing his movie costumes to please wife Deborra-Lee Furness) She loves the idea of me coming home in costume because it makes her feel like she's having an affair - in a good way. When we met, I was cast as a prisoner with tattoos and she'd say, 'Don't take your tattoos off tonight!' and I'd be like, 'All right!' But what works best with her is the stockbroker look. She also says, 'Do your sexy dance for me,' an 80s-like, hip-swivelling number, and that works for me!

Hugh: I've always felt that if you back down from a fear, the ghost of that fear never goes away. It diminishes people. So I've always said 'yes' to the thing I'm most scared about. The fear of letting myself down - of saying 'no' to something that I was afraid of and then sitting in my room later going, 'I wish I'd had the guts to say this or that' - that galvanizes me more than anything.

Hugh: (on his role of Wolverine) Now I meet people with full-color Wolverine tattoos on their backs. Thank God I did okay, because I think if I hadn't, they'd spit on me in the street.

Hugh: It's a little strange when you're on the stage and people fling underwear at you. It was clean underwear, by the way! I made the ultimate error the first time it was done to go, 'Oh, is that for me?' and to put it on. From that moment, in every second show, something flew my way.

Hugh: I did the show [The Boy From Oz] in Australia in an arena of 15,000 people. It was all my rock-star fantasies come true, except I was in sequins which is not exactly how I'd imagined it! It was like a celebration. It was on that grand scale, yet it was a story about an Australian with an all-Australian cast. It featured songs like I still Call Australia Home, which is almost like our national anthem. I'd look out there and people would just be in tears. It was really satisfying.

Hugh: Americans are the most generous country on the planet. I've worked in Europe, I've worked in Australia. There is no where else where you get absolutely no attitude for being a foreigner. If you do your job well, they embrace you.

Hugh (talking about an X-Men kissing scene): I had to lay down there and think of England as one by one they bring out the girls. It was a very tough morning. After each girl had finished, the crew would hold up scorecards.

Hugh: Basically, I'll make an ass of myself anywhere.

Hugh: Being on Broadway is the modern equivalent of being a monk. I sleep a lot, eat a lot, and rest a lot.