It’s been a long time coming. Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart play two of the X-Men franchise’s most beloved characters to date. But after Logan, the duo is done for good. While Jackman confirmed his Wolverine retirement a while back, Patrick Stewart just made his decision and gave a long explanation in an recent interview with Entertainment Weekly.
“A week ago, Friday night in Berlin, the three of us sat, watching the movie,” said Stewart. “And I was so moved by it, much more moved than I had been the first time of seeing it. Maybe it was the company of these two guys, but the movie ended and — this is an admission — but at one point [Hugh] reached out, and he took my hand in those last few minutes, and I saw him go [mimes wiping a tear from his eye] like this, and then I realized I had just done the same thing. Then, the movie ended… and we were going to be taken up on stage, but not until the credits were over. So, we had some time to sit there and, as I sat there I realized there will never be a better, a more perfect, a more sensitive, emotional, and beautiful way of saying au revoir to Charles Xavier than this movie. So, I told [Hugh] that same evening, ‘I’m done too. It’s all over.'”
Jackman also recently elaborated on how he made his decision to stop playing Wolverine, and his reasoning includes the influence of Jerry Seinfeld. Two years ago, before Logan, he asked Jerry about his decision to wrap Seinfeld , “What was the tipping point?”
“He was very clear. He said, ‘Look, when you’re creating something it’s very important not to run yourself dry. It’s not about finishing on top, necessarily, but making sure you’re, creatively, still got something left, which propels you into the whatever’s next.’
“I went home and said, ‘Deb, this is it. This is the last one,’” Jackman continued. “And then, like, the next morning, I wake up at four in the morning and I record into a voice memo because I had this really strong idea of what to do for the next one, and that’s like two years ago or something.”
Watch Jackman tell the whole story on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
Logan arrives in theaters March 3.
