LilMtnCbn
05-22-2004, 06:26 AM
Bwwwaaa!!! You read it here first!! Fetal adoption!
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14264540&method=full&site
id=50143&headline=i-had-to-abandon-my-son-hugh----he-was-only-eight-years-
old-name_page.html
WHY HUGH'S MUM WALKED OUT ON HIM
May 22 2004
Exclusive by Fiona Cummins
JUST moments after an emotional Hugh Jackman watched the birth of his adopted
son, he made a telephone call to his mum.
It was not unusual or entirely unexpected, but for Grace Watson it confirmed
once and for all that the Hollywood star had forgiven her for walking out on
him when he was only eight.
Even now, it is a memory which makes her shudder.
For Grace did the unthinkable. She abandoned her husband Chris, her five
children and her life in Australia to return to her native Britain.
Van Helsing star Hugh arrived home from school to find her gone. She sent a
telegram the next day to say she wasn't coming back.
He rarely talks about that troubled time, but Grace confesses: "It's not
something I'm proud of and I must have been desperate.
"It was the most difficult thing I ever had to do and nothing will ever seem
that hard again.
"Looking back, I don't think I made the right decision, but I don't regret it
because it isn't something I can change. I felt they were better off where they
were.
"Perhaps I should have stayed, but my children have grown up well-adjusted and
happy. Who knows if they would have been like that if their parents had been
arguing all the time?
"Hugh is very loving, kind and generous. We've moved on now. We dealt with my
walking out when he was in his early teens and throughout everything we stayed
in touch."
Retired sociologist Grace has long settled her differences with her famous son
and has just returned from visiting him, his actress wife Deborra-Lee Furness
and grandson Oscar in New York.
Grace smiles with joy as she talks about the four-year-old, whose real mother
agreed to let the Jackmans adopt her baby when she was five months pregnant.
"They adopted him before he was born and both Hugh and Deb were at the birth,"
she reveals.
"They both wanted to be deeply involved.
AFTER he was born, Deb was so excited she was bouncing around saying: 'I've
just had a baby' even though she technically didn't give birth and everyone was
saying: 'She's in good shape.'
"They haven't made any secret of it to Oscar. They paid the adoption fees and
expenses, but it wasn't like a surrogacy. The agency puts birth mothers in
touch with prospective parents."
Hugh, 35, who now commands £7million for a film, is currently thrilling
audiences as a vampire-hunter in the blockbuster Van Helsing with Kate
Beckinsale.
His big break came when he won the part of the heroic mutant Wolverine in X-Men
four years ago and he went on to star in the spy thriller Swordfish with John
Travolta.
He famously turned down the chance to play Billy Flynn in the Oscar-nominated
Chicago, a role that went to Richard Gere.
He has been nominated for a Tony award - and received rave reviews - for his
performance in the Broadway musical The Boy From Oz. He is also tipped to play
the next James Bond. Grace always knew he would be famous, but insists his
celebrity hasn't changed him at all.
"When he was younger I always used to say to him: 'Stop showing off - it won't
get you anywhere'," she says.
"We never thought of acting as a career. It was more a hobby you did in your
spare time. Now I say: 'Sorry, darling - I was completely wrong.'
"But he doesn't use his celebrity - he accepts fame as part of the job and he's
very down-to-earth.
"He's just Hugh to me, although I always knew he would be very successful.
"Most people who play James Bond are made famous by the role. Hugh might be too
expensive. I like to see him in anything, but I love him best as Hugh."
Grace went to the X-Men premiere with Hugh and visited him on the Van Helsing
set in Prague. He regularly asks her advice about parts he chooses.
"I always read the books his films are based on, although I don't think Bram
Stoker's Dracula and Van Helsing have much in common," she says, wrinkling her
nose. "Still, it was huge fun, a popcorn film."
Despite Hugh's wealth, Grace, 65, does not appear interested in the luxurious
trappings of his fame. She watched Van Helsing in her local cinema in Norwich
and lives in a tiny, warden-controlled flat in a street in the city known for
its drug deals.
SHE explains: "Hugh is the most generous person and I'm sure he'd give me
anything I'd want to have, but I hate the idea of living in a big house in the
country.
"Nobody here really knows I'm Hugh's mum. To be honest, they probably wouldn't
know who he is."
There is another reason why Grace lives in the block of flats. Three years ago
she was hit by a crippling virus which attacked her central nervous system and
left with symptoms similar to a stroke.
It affected the right side of her body and she had to learn to walk and talk
again.
"It was pretty awful," she says. "Hugh was filming Swordfish, and he called me
at the hospital and sent flowers. It happened while I was working in London and
was very frightening. It pulled me up short.
"I had to give up work and the home I shared with two friends. The doctors
still don't know what caused it.
"But my children have been wonderfully supportive and thankfully I've made a
complete recovery."
Grace moved to Australia with her British accountant husband Chris in the early
60s and Hugh was born in Sydney in October 1968. When she returned to Britain
in 1976, she cared for her elderly mother, who was seriously ill.
She has six children , including daughter Rowan from her second marriage, and
has married three times but now lives alone.
"I'm not very good at marriage," she admits ruefully. "I get bored. I'm much
better with children."
Proudly brandishing a theatre programme featuring Hugh and flicking through a
photo album packed with shots of him, she adds: "We've always had quite a
special relationship, Hugh and me.
"Our thought processes are similar and we know instinctively if something is
wrong in the other's life."
Hugh even introduced her to Philosophy of Life, a class she attends weekly in
London which teaches "how to live life more creatively".
"Hugh is interested in this and Oscar goes to the Philosophy of Life nursery,"
she explains.
Despite walking out on Hugh all those years ago, Grace firmly believes they
have repaired their relationship.
"He is a lovely, down-to-earth, talented man and I am very, very proud of him,"
she says.
-------------------------
A good friend will come and bail you out of jail . . . but, a true friend will
be sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"
-----Unknown
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14264540&method=full&site
id=50143&headline=i-had-to-abandon-my-son-hugh----he-was-only-eight-years-
old-name_page.html
WHY HUGH'S MUM WALKED OUT ON HIM
May 22 2004
Exclusive by Fiona Cummins
JUST moments after an emotional Hugh Jackman watched the birth of his adopted
son, he made a telephone call to his mum.
It was not unusual or entirely unexpected, but for Grace Watson it confirmed
once and for all that the Hollywood star had forgiven her for walking out on
him when he was only eight.
Even now, it is a memory which makes her shudder.
For Grace did the unthinkable. She abandoned her husband Chris, her five
children and her life in Australia to return to her native Britain.
Van Helsing star Hugh arrived home from school to find her gone. She sent a
telegram the next day to say she wasn't coming back.
He rarely talks about that troubled time, but Grace confesses: "It's not
something I'm proud of and I must have been desperate.
"It was the most difficult thing I ever had to do and nothing will ever seem
that hard again.
"Looking back, I don't think I made the right decision, but I don't regret it
because it isn't something I can change. I felt they were better off where they
were.
"Perhaps I should have stayed, but my children have grown up well-adjusted and
happy. Who knows if they would have been like that if their parents had been
arguing all the time?
"Hugh is very loving, kind and generous. We've moved on now. We dealt with my
walking out when he was in his early teens and throughout everything we stayed
in touch."
Retired sociologist Grace has long settled her differences with her famous son
and has just returned from visiting him, his actress wife Deborra-Lee Furness
and grandson Oscar in New York.
Grace smiles with joy as she talks about the four-year-old, whose real mother
agreed to let the Jackmans adopt her baby when she was five months pregnant.
"They adopted him before he was born and both Hugh and Deb were at the birth,"
she reveals.
"They both wanted to be deeply involved.
AFTER he was born, Deb was so excited she was bouncing around saying: 'I've
just had a baby' even though she technically didn't give birth and everyone was
saying: 'She's in good shape.'
"They haven't made any secret of it to Oscar. They paid the adoption fees and
expenses, but it wasn't like a surrogacy. The agency puts birth mothers in
touch with prospective parents."
Hugh, 35, who now commands £7million for a film, is currently thrilling
audiences as a vampire-hunter in the blockbuster Van Helsing with Kate
Beckinsale.
His big break came when he won the part of the heroic mutant Wolverine in X-Men
four years ago and he went on to star in the spy thriller Swordfish with John
Travolta.
He famously turned down the chance to play Billy Flynn in the Oscar-nominated
Chicago, a role that went to Richard Gere.
He has been nominated for a Tony award - and received rave reviews - for his
performance in the Broadway musical The Boy From Oz. He is also tipped to play
the next James Bond. Grace always knew he would be famous, but insists his
celebrity hasn't changed him at all.
"When he was younger I always used to say to him: 'Stop showing off - it won't
get you anywhere'," she says.
"We never thought of acting as a career. It was more a hobby you did in your
spare time. Now I say: 'Sorry, darling - I was completely wrong.'
"But he doesn't use his celebrity - he accepts fame as part of the job and he's
very down-to-earth.
"He's just Hugh to me, although I always knew he would be very successful.
"Most people who play James Bond are made famous by the role. Hugh might be too
expensive. I like to see him in anything, but I love him best as Hugh."
Grace went to the X-Men premiere with Hugh and visited him on the Van Helsing
set in Prague. He regularly asks her advice about parts he chooses.
"I always read the books his films are based on, although I don't think Bram
Stoker's Dracula and Van Helsing have much in common," she says, wrinkling her
nose. "Still, it was huge fun, a popcorn film."
Despite Hugh's wealth, Grace, 65, does not appear interested in the luxurious
trappings of his fame. She watched Van Helsing in her local cinema in Norwich
and lives in a tiny, warden-controlled flat in a street in the city known for
its drug deals.
SHE explains: "Hugh is the most generous person and I'm sure he'd give me
anything I'd want to have, but I hate the idea of living in a big house in the
country.
"Nobody here really knows I'm Hugh's mum. To be honest, they probably wouldn't
know who he is."
There is another reason why Grace lives in the block of flats. Three years ago
she was hit by a crippling virus which attacked her central nervous system and
left with symptoms similar to a stroke.
It affected the right side of her body and she had to learn to walk and talk
again.
"It was pretty awful," she says. "Hugh was filming Swordfish, and he called me
at the hospital and sent flowers. It happened while I was working in London and
was very frightening. It pulled me up short.
"I had to give up work and the home I shared with two friends. The doctors
still don't know what caused it.
"But my children have been wonderfully supportive and thankfully I've made a
complete recovery."
Grace moved to Australia with her British accountant husband Chris in the early
60s and Hugh was born in Sydney in October 1968. When she returned to Britain
in 1976, she cared for her elderly mother, who was seriously ill.
She has six children , including daughter Rowan from her second marriage, and
has married three times but now lives alone.
"I'm not very good at marriage," she admits ruefully. "I get bored. I'm much
better with children."
Proudly brandishing a theatre programme featuring Hugh and flicking through a
photo album packed with shots of him, she adds: "We've always had quite a
special relationship, Hugh and me.
"Our thought processes are similar and we know instinctively if something is
wrong in the other's life."
Hugh even introduced her to Philosophy of Life, a class she attends weekly in
London which teaches "how to live life more creatively".
"Hugh is interested in this and Oscar goes to the Philosophy of Life nursery,"
she explains.
Despite walking out on Hugh all those years ago, Grace firmly believes they
have repaired their relationship.
"He is a lovely, down-to-earth, talented man and I am very, very proud of him,"
she says.
-------------------------
A good friend will come and bail you out of jail . . . but, a true friend will
be sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"
-----Unknown
