Hugh Jackman on His Closeted Con Artist in ‘Bad Education’ and Turning Down ‘Cats’; Daily Beast, April 16, 2020

Marlow Stern, Daily Beast; Hugh Jackman on His Closeted Con Artist in ‘Bad Education’ and Turning Down ‘Cats’

"The film makes you think about how educators are compensated, and in these pandemic-stricken times, people have been paying more mind to what is considered an “essential” worker and how society compensates them. 

I’ve thought about this a lot. You look at actors like me who, in certain movies, get paid ridiculous amounts of money, and the ethos is, Oh, this is due to market forces and what the market drives, and if you’re not worthy you don’t get it, but it’s astonishing what is happening, where people at the top are getting paid exorbitant amounts while people at the bottom’s wages are stagnating. And here we are in a situation where we’re truly valuing what is actually “essential.” We’re really valuing nurses, teachers, doctors, firemen and women, garbage collectors—all these people who are out there working we’re valuing, and they’re people who I think we’ve neglected for many years. This is something we’re all going to have to look at. The idea of, Well, the market dictates that and it’s not a moral issue is going to get questioned."