Hugh Jackman, Daniel Craig Make Cell-Phone Interruption Their Bitch During A Steady Rain

A performance of A Steady Rain, the Broadway police drama co-starring Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig, was disrupted not once, but twice by an audience member’s ringing cell phone.  Even worse, the calls came during a gripping scene where Jackman, playing a Chicago cop, recounts disturbing memories to Craig’s character.  Ever the professionals, Jackman and Craig never broke character, preferring to integrate the incident into the play and build tension by trying to convince the audience that an Aussie and a Brit can pull off a Chicago accent.  If ridiculous tabloids like Midnight Star and The Weekly World News are to be believed–and they aren’t!–this isn’t the only time these folks made the best of a bad situation.

Legend has it that when auditioning for James Bond in Casino Royale Craig was sitting next to Pierce Brosnan, who was fighting to keep his spot as the dashing British secret agent.  As the casting director called Brosnan in for a reading, Craig accidentally spilled a cup of boiling hot Colombian coffee in Brosnan’s lap.  Brosnan screamed obscenities, while Craig coolly offered, “Sorry about the Valdez spill old chap, but I’ve never bean Juan to apologize.”  Impressed with Craig’s ability to remain calm and quippy under pressure, the casting director immediately offered him the role of Bond.  Brosnan went on to star in Seraphim Falls,  Butterfly on a Wheel, and Married Life; and perhaps other gigs that require British accents, like trying to convince American daytime TV viewers to add gold to their portfolios.

Jackman also made lemons into lemonade, almost literally!  Totally anonymous sources say that the original X-Men script called for Wolverine to tap-dance his adversaries into submission, then spray lemon juice from ducts in the top of his hands into their eyes.  Director Bryan Singer did not know about Jackman’s citric acid allergy, however.  When Jackman erupted in a violent sneezing fit and ejected foot-long, razor-sharp adamantium claws from between his knuckles (a genetic defect inherited from his mother), Singer smelled a new, more impressive mutant power*.  (He smelled it because the claws, covered in flesh bits and lemon pulp, ended up inches from his face.)  Now, instead of a off-Broadway jazz-tap musical revue, Wolverine has his own bellowing, explosion-filled X-Men movie.

*Singer also noticed that between takes Jackman would entertain the film crew by stubbing cigars out on his forearm and then healing the seared skin within seconds.   Singer incorporated the snarling cigar-chompery, but absolutely nothing else, into the Wolverine character.

And rumor is that the offending audience member had planned on yelling, “Play some Skynyrd!” in a redneck accent but was preempted by his cell phone.  Instead, he urinated himself in embarrassment and sat quietly for the rest of the play.

So you see, Daniel, Hugh, and Choad show ya what your mama told ya: things happen for a reason!