Hugh Jackman to Star in Musical about Harry Houdini?

One of the most enjoyable and  memorable musicals I have ever seen was on Broadway when Hugh Jackman gave a Tony winning performance in The Boy from Oz.  He was also amazing as Curly in Oklahoma! which was directed by Trevor Nunn at the National Theatre in 1998, so I am hoping that his next theatre project which is a musical biography of Harry Houdini gets to the stage.

He is doing a workshop in January 2011 with some of the creative team already on board: Aaron Sorkin, (writer), Danny Elfman (composer) and Jack O’Brien directing.

The Houdini musical has been in the pipeline for a couple of years and hopefully Jackman’s involvement will speed up the process.  Jackman says it’s just one of several stage projects in development. “I’m working on two or three things, because I don’t want to be away from the stage for too long. New musicals take a long time to get into shape, so I have a feeling it may be something else first on Broadway. But if Houdini is ready, I’ll do that. I’m practicing my magic tricks right now.”

Jackman is also involved in a planned feature film version of Carousel in which he would reportedly star as Billy Bigelow opposite Anne Hathaway as Julie Jordan. “We love it, I love it, and we’re working on it,” he said. “Now we just have to convince people to pay for it!”