Hugh Jackman talks ‘Reminiscence’ — and why he’d rather relive his honeymoon than his wedding
If someone invented a device that allowed you to relive any moment from you past, what is the first memory you would revisit?
Such a contraption exists in Lisa Joy’s new film noirish sci-fi film Reminiscence — albeit in a world you would otherwise not much like to inhabit. Her dystopian Miami in the not-too-distant future has been ravaged by war and flooding, an existence so bleak that its citizens pay top dollar to Hugh Jackman’s ex-soldier for a dip in his “reminiscence tank” that allows them to escape to happier times.
“I’m going back to falling in love with my wife,” said Jackman, who married actress and producer Deborra-Lee Furness in Australia in 1996, told Yahoo Entertainment about his hypothetical trip down memory lane in real life (watch above).
“I was going to say wedding day, but honestly I’d probably go honeymoon over wedding day [laughs]. It’s stressful, wedding days are stressful. My wife and I had 220 people, we calculated that we spent 36 seconds with each person, if I saw everybody. It was like being grabbed and pulled.”
In terms of the popular X-Men and The Greatest Showman star’s career, he says, “There’s so much that I would love to relive because when you’re in the middle of it, there are brief moments [when] you’re aware that something great is happening, but a lot of the time, whether you’re hosting the Oscars or you’re on set with Ian McKellen or you’re singing Les Mis, there’s a pressure to it. So to be able to go back and really just relive it without all that ‘What if I never work again?’ pressure would be great.”
For Rebecca Ferguson, who plays the femme fatale to Jackman’s riff on Philip Marlowe, it’s the moment that set her now-booming career into motion.
“It’s going to the moment I was driving the car with my mom in Sweden [near] apple orchids and water, [it was] beautiful, and then I get a call saying I’ve been given the lead role in The White Queen,” the Mission: Impossible and Doctor Sleep star says about her breakout role in the 2013 British miniseries.
“That was sort of the start of my career, I think. It was a huge stepping stone out of Sweden and into the world.”
Watch our full interview with Joy, Jackman, Ferguson and co-star Thandiwe Newton above.
Reminiscence is now playing in theaters and on HBO Max.
— Video produced by Anne Lilburn and edited by Jimmie Rhee
Watch the trailer:
