Jackman makes splash heckling the audience

The ad-libbing is a tribute to singer-songwriter Peter Allen's interactive style.
NEW YORK (AP) -- Hey ladies (and guys who think he's hot): Wanna meet Hugh Jackman? It's easy, though it could be expensive and a little embarrassing.
All you have to do is buy tickets for his Broadway musical "The Boy From Oz," preferably in the front row, and show up late, preferably after the first couple of numbers have come and gone.
You will undoubtedly find yourself on the receiving end of what has become Jackman's now-famous heckling.
That's where a group of four tardy women were during a recent matinee when Jackman -- who remained flamboyantly in character as Australian singer-songwriter Peter Allen -- forced them to stand up, swivel their hips and show the rest of the audience the fake Kate Spade purse one of them had just bought.
The foursome -- and the audience -- ate it up.
A little wary
"I was a bit nervous about it at first. I mean, what if you start heckling someone who stumps you? And New Yorkers are pretty vocal," said Jackman, star of the new movie "Van Helsing."
"Then after a while I kind of realized, it kind of doesn't matter if you come up with something that's not very funny. ... People just, I think, like the fact that you're going off the script and that you interact with them. And the effect on the show -- I think it's made the audience more relaxed."
Relaxed is a great word to describe Jackman, too, even though the roles he's best known for are intense characters who couldn't be more different from one other.
'X-Men' actor
The 35-year-old Australian actor first became known to American audiences as the morose, metal-clawed mutant Wolverine in the first "X-Men" movie in 2000, a role he reprised in the 2003 sequel. (In between, he squeezed in a couple of forgettable romantic comedies, "Someone Like You" with Ashley Judd and "Kate & amp; Leopold" with Meg Ryan, and the crime thriller "Swordfish," with Halle Berry's bare breasts.)
In "Van Helsing," another big action movie, he takes on Dracula, Frankenstein's monster and the Wolf Man.
But his background was in musical theater, most notably "Oklahoma!" in London. His stage charisma and booming voice led him to playing Allen, Liza Minnelli's first ex-husband, who wrote "I Honestly Love You" for Olivia Newton-John and "I Go to Rio" for himself before dying of AIDS in 1992.
The aerobically demanding role has earned Jackman universal rave reviews (though critics haven't been quite so kind to the show itself) and he's a nominee June 6 at the Tonys -- which he happens to be hosting for the second consecutive year.
"I get people coming to the show, I know are only coming because they've seen me in 'X-Men.' ... I don't mind that. When I trained at acting school you do fencing, Shakespeare class, modern dance, circus school, all before lunch," he said in an interview with The Associated Press.
"For me as the actor, I loved that. So I kind of have to believe that audiences don't mind seeing you in different things. ... If they only want to see me in one thing, so be it. But I don't worry about it too much."
Ad-libbing begins
"The Boy From Oz" director Phil McKinley said the on-stage ad-libbing began as a nod to Allen's interactive style.
"He has become brilliant at it, and the audience loves it," McKinley said.
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