THE GREATEST SHOWMAN (2017) Production Notes

The film is a musical reverie, an ode to dreams, not a biopic. But at its center is Barnum's conviction that the drudgery of everyday life is something you can bust through into a realm of wonder, curiosity and the joys of being proudly different.

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ABOUT THE PRODUCTION

Step right up...and into the spellbinding imagination of a man who set out to reveal that life itself can be the most thrilling show of all. Inspired by the legend and ambitions of America's original pop-culture impresario, P.T. Barnum, comes an inspirational rags-to-riches tale of a brash dreamer who rose from nothing to prove that anything you can envision is possible and that everyone, no matter how invisible, has a stupendous story worthy of a world-class spectacle.

Australian filmmaker Michael Gracey makes his feature film directorial debut with The Greatest Showman, a story that, in the larger-than-life spirit of Barnum, bursts into a boldly imagined fictional realm, one full of infectious pop tunes, glam dances and a celebration of the transformative power of showmanship, love and self-belief. Gracey braids together original songs by Academy Award winners Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (La La Land) with a multi-talented cast headed by Academy Award nominee Hugh Jackman to immerse audiences in the very origins of mass entertainment and mega-celebrities in the 70s ... the 1870s that is. The result is a chance to enter the newly electrified world of America's post-Civil War Gilded Age -- through the viscerally contemporary lens of the pop culture just igniting then.

P.T. Barnum may have lived over a century ago, but for Gracey, he was a progenitor of our times. He sees Barnum as a pioneer of today's visionaries and entrepreneurs who've revolutionized social life, the Steve Jobs or Jay-Z of his day. The film is a musical reverie, an ode to dreams, not a biopic. But at its center is Barnum's conviction that the drudgery of everyday life is something you can bust through into a realm of wonder, curiosity and the joys of being proudly different. Most of all Gracey hoped to key into the feeling of that moment of personal inspiration or acceptance when life seems grander than you ever expected. Says Gracey: "When audiences came to experience a P.T. Barnum spectacle, they were completely transported out of the ordinary, and we try to do the same in this film in a contemporary way."

Adds Jackman, who devoted himself for years to bring the film to the screen: "It's not exaggerating to say that Barnum ushered in modern-day America - and especially the idea that your talent, your imagination and your ability to work hard should be the only things that determine your success. He knew how to make something out of nothing, how to turn lemons into lemonade. I've always loved that quality. He followed his own path, and turned any setback he had into a positive. So many things I aspire to in my life are embodied in this one character."

The Greatest Showman also touches on another idea of these times: that of chosen families built around allowing people to express who they are without reservation. "A big idea in the film is that your real wealth is the people that you surround yourself with and the people who love you," says Gracey. "Barnum pulled people together who the world might otherwise have ignored. And by bringing each of these people into the light he created a family who were always going to be there for each other. In the course of the film, Barnum almost loses both his real family and his circus family - but then you watch him discover that the most important thing he can do is bring them both back together again."
Twentieth Century Fox presents The Greatest Showman, a Laurence Mark/Chernin Entertainment production starring Hugh Jackman. Michael Gracey directs from a screenplay by Jenny Bicks and Bill Condon and a story by Jenny Bicks. The producers are Laurence Mark, Peter Chernin and Jenno Topping, with James Mangold, Donald J. Lee, Jr. and Tonia Davis serving as executive producers. Joining with Jackman are Zac Efron as Barnum's partner, Phillip; four-time Academy Award-nominee Michelle Williams as Barnum's wife, Charity; Rebecca Ferguson as Swedish superstar Jenny Lind and Zendaya as the trapeze artist Anne Wheeler.

The behind-the-scenes team who bring 2017 filmmaking to the start of showbiz include two-time Academy Award nominated director of photography Seamus McGarvey; three-time Academy Award-nominated production designer Nathan Crowley, and costume designer Ellen Mirojnick. The score is by Oscar-nominated composer John Debney, and John Trapanese.

A DREAM COMES TO LIFE

When you think of Phineas Taylor Barnum today, what probably come instantly to mind is the three-ring extravaganza that long bore his name. But there is far more to his collosal legend than the circuses that have since evolved into a new era (an era that no longer parades endangered animals and human curiosities but is more about virtuoso athletic and creative performances). Barnum's is the classic tale of a scrappy American trailblazer, one who pulled himself way up out of poverty to become not only a master of the brand new arts of image and promotion but also one of America's first self-made millionaires and the godfather of mass entertainments designed to set free the imagination.

He may have been born into anonymity, but the whole world would come to know his name. When P.T. Barnum passed away in 1891, the Washington Post described him as "the most widely known American that ever lived."

Later, Barnum would be erroneously credited with the infamous quotation "a sucker is born every minute," which he never said. But he did say: "Whatever you do, do it with all your might." This was the real appeal of Barnum in his day - he captured the resilient, risk-taking spirit of changing times. He also presaged more spectacular times to come as movies, stage shows and digital technology would continue his explorations of making the implausible and mythical feel real and achievable. It's no wonder his story and persona have inspired numerous films - with Barnum being played by Wallace Beery in 1934's The Mighty Barnum, Burl Ives in 1967's Jules Verne's Rocket to the Moon and Burt Lancaster in 1986's Barnum.

Yet, it has been decades since P.T. Barnum's increasingly visible impact on the modern world has received a fresh look. That thought struck producer Laurence Mark and co-screenwriter Bill Condon in 2009 when they were working together on the Academy Awards broadcast featuring Hugh Jackman as host. Jackman's irrepressible love of all that goes into forging a dazzling show reminded them of Barnum.

Watching Jackman at work, Mark recalls: "I thought, wow, this guy's the greatest showman on earth - and that's when I went to P.T. Barnum in my head. Hugh is just about the only person in the world who could be both Wolverine and P.T. Barnum, actually. There's just something in Hugh's DNA that allows him to walk on a stage and take charge of it so easily, naturally and charismatically. I suggested to him them that we should make a musical about Barnum and it turned out, he was completely open to it."

It was a fateful proposition. But it would take another seven years and more than a few twists and turns to turn what was then an ultra-high-risk idea - especially given that musicals capable of appealing to 21st Century audiences were then considered an extreme rarity -- into the reality of a full-scale production replete with songs, choreography and an all-star cast. The process began with a sweeping screenplay by Jenny Bick, which excavated the period of Barnum's rise to fame, from his childhood of meager means in Connecticut, to the romancing of his much wealthier wife Charity, to the founding of Barnum's American Museum to his championing of one of the world's first superstars: the "Swedish Nightingale" Jenny Lind.

Bick's screenplay was an inspiring kick-off. Still, in keeping with Barnum's adoration of the daring and outsized in all things, the filmmakers decided to go in search of even more music and more spectacle. That's when Jackman suggested that Mark see if his friend Bill Condon - renown for his magical screen adaptations of Chicago and Dreamgirls - could add his own immense writing gifts in the creation of a musical for these times.

In the meantime, Jackman had met Michael Gracey, who was rapidly rising as a commercial and music video director with an unusually creative, genre-defying edge. Jackman was determined to work with him on a feature, and he was sure the concept of The Greatest Showman was a match made in heaven for Gracey. That became even more clear once Gracey began pitching the ambitious film across Hollywood with a fervor that kept even jaded executives rapt.

Says Jackman: "Michael is cutting edge with music and storytelling. He was kind of a big deal already, and even though he hadn't yet made a film, everybody knew about him. It's also true that when Michael pitched the story of The Greatest Showman, he was better than I've ever been playing P.T. Barnum. Michael's vision is incredible, but also, his determination is like nothing I've ever seen before. There was no option for him other than this movie getting made."

Gracey's pitch encompassed 45 minutes of spirited storytelling, intricate concept art and songs. It's part of what won him the deep trust of the producers, including Laurence Mark as well as Peter Chernin and Jenno Topping of Chernin Entertainment. "Michael had done so much impressive homework. He already had sketches and visuals and he spoke about the movie in the most passionate way," recalls Mark.

It all hit home in part because Gracey truly and personally relates to Barnum's belief in attempting to squeeze as much excitement out of life as possible. "I always say that to me one of the saddest moments in any child's life is when they learn the word 'impossible,'" the director reflects. "Barnum's story is about not limiting your imagination, about using what's in your head to create new worlds - and that's also what directors do. You come up with something and then you spend years and years of trying to realize it, in a process that is full of heartache but also allows you to truly bring dreams to life."

Gracey was also driven by a fully fleshed-out vision for the film's aesthetic. He had in mind a Steampunk-like mash-up of the past and the future that placed Barnum's story outside of period, in a kind of universal world where pop culture, romance and human connections always hold sway. He wanted some grit, but he also felt the entire film should be sprinkled over with a touch of storybook magic - to hark back to the shadows of the imagination that first inspired humans to suspend their disbelief.

Also vital to Gracey's approach were the Oddities, the circus performers who due to a variety of uncommon physical conditions allowed Barnum to invite audiences to encounter living myths. Though such displays would no longer be acceptable in today's society, Gracey explores another side of what Barnum's performers experienced - the opportunity to escape hidden, marginal lives; the chance to inspire admiration and feel pride; and most of all the ability to provoke questions into just how narrowly we define "normal." "The Oddities are people who are invisible to society so they've been kept behind closed doors," explains Gracey. "And what our P.T. Barnum does is give these invisible people a spotlight and a chance to feel love for the first time. He tells wondrous stories in which they are not damaged but special. I think audiences will love the Oddities because at the end of the day, everyone's an Oddity."

He emphasizes: "There's a line where Barnum says, 'No one ever made a difference by being like everyone else.' That to me is the heart of the film."

The Oddities definitely caught the attention of Zac Efron. He says: "I love that Barnum is full of love and dreams for his family but then he asks: how can I spread that love further? He does it by taking people who are not accepted by society because of the way they look or how they were born and allowing them to be celebrated and engaged with. He gives them a chance to show that no matter where you come from or who you are, none of us is really that different -- we're all just striving people. Barnum allows all the performers in his show to be proud of themselves."

With Condon having added fertile new layers to the script, there was just one vital component missing: the ineffable, transporting stuff of the actual songs. For Gracey, everything hinged on getting that right. "The reason I love musicals is that when words no longer suffice, that's when you sing. At your lowest points, when you've lost absolutely everything, you sing. And at your highest points of inexpressable joy, you break into song again. We knew we needed songs that could hit those emotional high and low points within this very special world," Gracey explains.

Gracey intuited that the songs could counterpoint the period setting - rather than going back in time, he wanted songs that would make the characters and dilemmas urgently of-the-moment. After commissioning samples from dozens of songwriters, the team fell in love with the work of two then-fledgling newcomers: Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. This was well before their play "Dear Evan Hanson" and years in advance of their Oscar-winning work on La La Land. But what Pasek and Paul offered up was a collection of emotional, high-energy pop tunes that could be on the radio in 2017. "Benj and Justin showed a rare ability to combine rock, pop and the contemporary Broadway sound," says Mark.

Adds Gracey: "What Benj and Justin created for this film is to me the best work they've ever done - and they've done some incredible work. They mix the contemporay with the classical seamlessly. They really giave the heart and soul of the film, those emotional highs and lows. They captured the spirit of it so perfectly. The songs they wrote are always taking you somewhere - each is a narrative in its own right."

The music also was a magnetic lure for the accomplished cast. Says recording artist and actor Zendaya, who plays trapeze artist Anne Wheeler: "Benj and Justin are young and they're fresh and what's so cool about the songs is that even though our story is set in the 1800's, their work feels completely contemporary, which I think makes it tangible for people now. It adds an element of magic,too. You're in a period piece, yet there's also pop songs and hip-hop dancing, which I think is really dope. It fuses Barnum's time period with our own. I feel that every single line of the music reflects the soul of the film."
Gracey was grateful for all who committed themselves - from the cast to the songwriters to the musicians to the incessantly creative crew who never stopped cultivating the vital details -- to realizing his dream, which was built on the foundation of Barnum's dreams. "The idea of doing an original musical is pretty much pure insanity," laughs Gracey. "But the one thing that I will always remember and hold dear is all the people who signed up for this impossible dream - who believed in it and brought it to life."

THE SHOWMAN COMETH: HUGH JACKMAN ON PLAYING P.T. BARNUM

"P.T. Barnum is what we would describe now as a disruptor. He thought life should be all about fun, imagination and hard work," says Hugh Jackman of the man whose outsized persona he takes on in The Greatest Showman. "Back in 1850, America wasn't as we know it today. You were limited by the family you were born into and your class. At the time, the idea of entertainment just for fun was considered almost borderline evil. But this only fueled Barnum's fire to break away from this kind of mundane, hamster wheel existence. He set out to live the life of his dreams. And that is what he did."

Born in Bethel, Connecticut in 1810, the real P.T. Barnum was as complex as his times, full of contradictory impulses, both humane and opportunistic. He had a natural flair for publicity and promotion and was already selling lottery tickets by age 12. Later, he won the hand of his far wealthier wife with his unalloyed aptitude for razzle-dazzle. After trying his hand at a variety of jobs, Barnum wound up in what he called "the show business," where his imagination would have no limits. He soon revealed himself to be a genius at an enterprise that would come to define America: generating excitement and drumming up hoopla, catering with savvy to the public's love of the spectacular, the wild and the outrageous.

Moving to New York, he became one of the burgeoning city's most celebrated figures. There, he opened what would become a destination all the rage: Barnum's American Museum on Broadway, stuffed with dioramas, scientific instruments, strange artifacts, a menagerie of exotic animals, a marine aquarium, theatrical performances and a slew of living "attractions" with fairytale stories attached -- including the diminutive General Tom Thumb, the Siamese twins Chang and Eng, giants, bearded ladies, and many more. The museum soon led to global tours featuring the most beloved performers. Barnum then created a public frenzy for the never-before-heard Swedish Opera singer Jenny Lind - with a mounting buzz and hysteria rivaling that surrounding rock stars a century later. When Barnum's museum burned to the ground, he came up with yet another fresh concept: the tent show known as "The Greatest Show on Earth," an idea which would long outlive him and inspire America's rise as the entertainment capital of the world.

While The Greatest Showman is not intended to be biographical and doesn't adhere to Barnum's factual chronology, Gracey emphasizes that it highlights several overarching realities about Barnum. "The important things that we know are true and wanted to reflect is that P.T. Barnum did come from nothing. He was there at the birth of advertising. And he was very successful and he did then chase after high society, because he felt that for all of his success, he was never one of them. He did bring out Jenny Lind from Sweden. His museum did burn to the ground and he went bankrupt not once but twice. So while we have creatively adjusted the story, many of the tentpole moments from his life are reflected."

As Laurence Mark had originally sensed, Jackman had an almost mystical affinity with Barnum. The Australian actor, singer, performer and producer has long straddled the high and the low in entertainment with ease. He is both a Tony Award winner and an Academy Award nominee, as known for the blistering action role of the superhero Wolverine as he is for singing on Broadway - not to mention having been dubbed "sexiest man alive."

Yet, he is also a family man, something Mark notes comes to the fore in this film. "I think this is the first movie in which Hugh has actually played a family man and calls upon that part of himself," notes the producer. "He makes it very much a story about a man who loses and then rediscovers his family - both his home family and his circus family who together mean everything in the world to him."

For Jackman, the role was irresistible, but the approach of The Greatest Showman was equally important, and a chance for him to wear his true heart on Barnum's woolen sleeves. He was most intrigued by the inspirational side of Barnum, the vastness of the world he envisioned. "What I like most is that at its heart, this is a film about taking risks, following your dreams and celebrating what makes each and every one of us unique," he says. "Barnum filled his show with the most talented but overlooked people he knew and gave them a magnificent spotlight in which to shine - and that's the story we've decided to tell."

He continues: "Barnum broke walls down and I think what he represents to us now is this idea that you can be whoever you are, you can choose the life you want regardless of class or race or background. If you work hard and use your imagination, you can do something amazing. I think Barnum was a little bit of an Oddity himself, growing up. He believed that what makes you different makes you special. That resonates with me in a huge way -- and I think everybody can relate to it, particularly young kids. That's why I'm thrilled that the theme of this movie is that it is empowering and cool just to be you."

Jackman shares that he, too, had to find the courage to be himself in terms of his love of dancing - at a time when taking dance lessons was not what the cool boys did. "I understand the pressures to follow the crowd, to fit in, to be a certain way," he says. "I truly love dance -- but there were eight years of my life that I didn't do it, just because I wanted to fit in. So now it resonates with me, and I think with most people on the planet, that to be authentically you is the only path that can bring you true happiness. Otherwise, you're putting on a mask to make other people happy. And as the father of two teenagers, I talk to them constantly about the idea that no matter who you are, no matter how you differ from supermodels and football players, it's irrelevant. Love yourself exactly the way you were born."

With all that swirling under the surface, Jackman dove into the role of Barnum with his all, rehearsing non-stop and serving as a leader amongst cast and crew, pushing everyone towards their limits. Gracey notes that Jackman couldn't help but raise the bar. "When you have Hugh at the front and you see him giving 150 percent every time -- you don't want to be the person next to him who's not!" muses the director. "So it just elevates everyone to see all that Hugh brings take after take."

At the production's very first rehearsals, Jackman demonstrated his zeal. He was supposed to be sidelined -- having had a minor surgery, he was temporarily forbidden from singing by his doctor -- but his heart could not follow his head on that one. "Watching the rehearsal was torture for me, absolute torture," Jackman recalls. "Because I so love the film's music, and because the story is so full of heart and is about fearless abandon, I just got caught up in it. When it came to the last song, I thought, 'Oh, I'll just do the beginning' ... and before I knew it, I was off and running. I was singing the entire thing and I couldn't stop. I just got completely taken away with the moment and suddenly my stitches had come apart. My doctor was not very happy with me. But that's how infectious the music for the film is!"

Once healed, Jackman was able to commit without reserve. He was especially exhilarated by the chance to explore new moves and techniques. "I did things dance-wise that I've never done before," he notes. "I do like to work hard - but I did sometimes wish my legs were twenty years younger!"

He also credits the director with giving him, and the entire cast, the room to find their characters even with such a dizzying array of cinematic elements to coordinate. "I feel that Michael is the real Barnum of this story," concludes Jackman. "I know I get credited playing him, but it's really Michael who makes me think most of Barnum. Without his instincts for creating a show we wouldn't be here today. He drove this thing the entire way to create what he believed in."

GILDED AGE PEOPLE, 2017 POP SONGS:
BENJ PASEK AND JUSTIN PAUL ON THE MUSIC

When Benj Pasek and Justin Paul came aboard The Greatest Showman to write the songs, they knew pretty quickly it was going to be like nothing else they had done. They had a wide-open canvas and Michael Gracey wanted to fill it with tunes and words full of timeless emotions and modern rock and pop references that could compel modern audiences to go on this fantastical journey with Barnum and his performers. Most of all, they had the chance to bring the past hurtling into the now through their music.

Recalls Justin Paul: "Michael's passion was so contagious -- that energy excited us. And we were drawn to this world full of color and life and imagination and dreaming. The idea of telling a period story with contemporary music was sort of terrifying in the beginning but it was also a very intriguing challenge. Writing these songs pushed us to explore a mix of styles that we might never have otherwise tried."

Adds Pasek: "Because we were writing songs to support a story about opening up to a world of wonder, we had the chance to infuse into our process that sense of joy. The Greatest Showman mixes in many things we love: it embraces what musicals can do that no other art form can, it has emotions that pierce the heart in ways words can't, and it's about pop music. So getting to combine these inspirations while creating songs that could musically and lyrically serve these great characters was incredible for us."

Throughout, Gracey was a partner in the creativity. "We tend not to write with anyone in the room with us -- we're very sort of private and secretive about our process," admits Pasek. "But Michael was our third collaborator on almost every song, and was part of the writing from concept to final result. Michael really pushed us to be motivated most by character, to find a unique voice for every one of them."

As this was well before La La Land, and Pasek and Paul knew they had a mandate to prove themselves as unknowns, they especially welcomed Gracey's confidence in them, which never wavered. "Michael really became our champion and because we talked to him at depth about every emotional moment, we were able to write something that was illuminating for each member of the cast," says Paul.

Once the songs -- and casting -- were complete, Pasek and Paul rehearsed with the actors as if they were about to open up on Broadway, rather than shoot a feature film. "We truly rehearsed as if we were about to have a live show," Paul explains. "Our rehearsal space in Brooklyn was everything that you would dream it to be: there were dance rehearsals going on in one room and singing rehearsals in the other room and the only difference from a Broadway show was that we also had a little recording studio where we could start to lay down tracks. It was all very surreal to have these incredibly talented, massive movie stars walk into the rehearsal hall in their dance clothes and start singing our songs."

The recording sessions were equally intense. "The recording was a process of quantity, getting tons and tons of material, and the actors were relentless," recalls Pasek. "They would come in for three-hour sessions at a time, singing their songs again and again, going line-by-line at times. It was all about pulling out the best of the best performances, assuring they matched the incredible energy on-screen."

Nailing the opening song, "The Greatest Show," which bookends the film, was an adventure of its own. "That song was written in a way that we'd never written a song before. Michael wanted it to feel like that moment you're anticipating someone bigger-than-life coming out on stage, someone like a Kanye or Steve Jobs, an impresario who inspires sweaty anticipation. We wrote six different takes and none worked for Michael," Paul recalls. "We then tried to write something new with him in the room and we were just banging our heads against the wall when he said, 'let me play you something I came up with before this session.' What he played was just a beat, but from that beat we started writing the melody and lyrics around it, doing a 'Ladies and gents, this is the moment...' kind of thing and it flowed. The one thing Michael most wanted was swagger. Barnum's at the height of his powers to make the audience wonder: what is about to happen? So you're anticipating and then the fireball blows and everything comes to life."

Gracey inspired the song and the song in turn inspired Gracey. He says: "I wanted this song to make people eating popcorn to have to stop, look up and be like, what? Benj and Justin gave us music so punchy and lyrics that are so strong that I knew I then had to deliver even more on the spectacle."

"A Million Dreams" offered a different kind of challenge: moving through time. "This song tracks Barnum him from a child through pursuing Charity to their life in the city together. The central idea is that Barnum's dream never stops driving him," says Paul. Adds Pasek: "We were thinking about how a kid who feels underestimated would express his hope. That's why there's a childlike innocence to the music -- you never really think about how hard the work of achieving your goals will be until you get there."

Gracey was taken aback by the warmth of "A Million Dreams." "Melodically, it was so beautiful, it became the default theme of the film."

"Come Alive" is another favorite of the pair. "It's the moment when Barnum starts to achieve his goal of bringing color to the monotony. He's built his museum and his dream is evolving," comments Paul. "We saw the song as Barnum wanting to give this feeling to other people, so he gives it to the Oddities and then they give it to the audience and then audience gives it to their friends and family all around the city. That was fun to do in a song."

The bar song "The Other Side" was written as a showdown as Jackman's Barnum tries to convince Efron's defiant Carlyle to join his circus. "We wanted to have a kind of musical face-off between Hugh and Zac, so we wanted it to be fast-paced and high energy but also believable emotionally," recalls Paul. "An acoustic guitar vibe came into it and it took on the quality of a Western saloon shoot-out."

"Benj and Justin cover so much narrative scope in this song - starting with Barnum negotiating with Phillip in the bar to being at the circus to Phillip falling in love with Anne at first sight," notes Gracey. "That's just an amazing arc to achieve. What was even more exciting is that as we rehearsed the song, you could see Hugh and Zac becoming friends and their interplay deepening."

One of the more romantic songs is "Rewrite The Stars," a duet between Efron and Zendaya. "That moment is about Phillip's decision to leave behind the rules of upper-class society and pursue Anne. He's saying to her the rules don't exist anymore for me anymore and can't you dream this with me? But Anne is more practical because she's dealt with more hardship than he's ever known," Pasek elucidates. "This is the moment they decide to jettison the notion that their love is impossible and dream of a better future. Of course, that's also what Barnum is always pushing, especially the way Hugh portrays him."

Zendaya added her own personal stamp to the song. Recalls Gracey: "It was Zendaya who suggesting starting a capella, with Zac just singing it to Anne without any music. We tried it and it turned out be such a great transition into the song."

Charity Barnum's solo, "Tightrope," is a different kind of love song. "It's a song that explores how she is willing to give everything over to this guy who is a loose cannon, knowing it isn't a safe bet," muses Pasek. Adds Paul: "It has the lilt of a love song and yet there's also an undertone of longing. And that's where Michelle Williams' contribution comes in, because she's such a nuanced actress and brings so much complexity to it. You see Charity really grappling with her conflicting feelings. She knows this is what she signed up for with Barnum, yet she's also experiencing the darker side of that."

The anthemic "This is Me" took several tries, but Pasek and Paul are overwhelmed by what emerged. "We realized we needed the raw power of a really, really intense female voice to express the importance of learning to love yourself, to empower yourself, even when the whole world tells you that you don't deserve to be loved," Pasek says. "When we thought about it that way, the music and lyrics started flowing." Paul continues: "It was very inspired by current pop songs, something you might hear from Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson or Pink - women with power and authority who can deliver a message in a contemporary way, and that's exactly what Keala Settle brought to us in her performance."

Recalls Gracey: "When Keala sang that in the workshop, it, it brought the house down. It was such a moment, when we could see the song was everything that we hoped it would be. She took it to another level with such a truth and an honesty."

Perhaps the film's most seductive song is "Never Enough," which Rebecca Ferguson's Jenny Lind sings to Barnum. Says Paul, "It's a song about insatiable desire but it's a real performance piece because it's not a dance number. It's about Rebecca standing there and delivering in a mesmerizing way."

Jackman's song "From Now On," on the other hand, is about seeking redemption. "That song is about Barnum coming to terms with the mistakes he's made with Charity," says Paul. "It begins in a hush and build and builds until the moment where he has to rush down the street trying to win his family back."

"From Now On" is Gracey's favorite, he confesses. "I just love it because it's the eleven o'clock number. Barnum is down in his dumps, having lost everything, but when the Oddities come in he's convinced that things can change. The minute we first heard Hugh sing it in the very first workshop, I saw that he was really able to bring home that idea that Barnum remembers who he was doing this all for in the first place and that's why he returns to his family."

Each of the songs exists on its own but taken together, they forge something larger and grander than the sum of their parts, which was an inspiration for the rest of the production. Says choreographer Ashley Wallen: "Justin and Benj write songs that are so powerful emotionally, it's the greatest joy to choreograph to them. When a song means so much to you and you like it beyond using it for your work, it makes you that much more creative. Their music is so original and their words are just transporting. They not only know how to tell a story but to write songs that are just really, really good tunes."

The film's musical soundscape goes beyond the songs, with a score by two-time Oscar-winner John Debney, and by Joseph Trapanese, which Pasek and Paul were thrilled to find synched seamlessly with their work. Says Paul: "John and Joseph created an entire musical palette and a beautiful set of melodies that relate to the songs in their own way. They took what we did and interpreted it through their own talent to add another beautiful layer to the storytelling."

CHARITY AND THE SWEDISH NIGHTINGALE:
MICHELLE WILLIAMS AND REBECCA FERGUSON

From their first encounter until his death, Charity Hallet Barnum would be P.T. Barnum's greatest source of strength and love. He met the seamstress from a wealthy family when he was still a poor and unknown teenager and proceeded to court her despite their glaring class difference. He won her love and the pair had four daughters together. "As a boy, P.T. had nothing and Charity lived in a world of privilege beyond anything he'd known," explains Michael Gracey. "But what's beautiful is that even though Charity has so much, all she wants is to spend her time with P.T. because he possesses something money can't buy: imagination. When Charity sees the world though P.T.'s eyes, it's a magical place."

Fully embodying the role is Michelle Williams, a four-time Oscar nominee including most recently as an emotionally devastated mother in Manchester By The Sea. Williams often brings the most unexpected take to her performances, and this role was no exception. Says Laurence Mark: "As Charity, Michelle has this amazing way of being tough and soft at the same time. In many ways, Charity is the backbone of everything P.T. does -- and yet Michelle also plays this strong woman very tenderly."

Adds Michael Gracey: "Michelle really grounds the story in the drama, which is so necessary to make the musical moments work. You can feel the way she and Hugh connected and you 100 percent buy her worries as well as her joy. When you see her on the roof with Barnum making a wishing machine out of nothing, you understand why she loves this man - and Michelle can do that with a single look."

Charity's love, and the price she sometimes pays for it, comes across vividly in the song "Tightrope," which was a focus for Williams in her intensive preparation. "Michelle's performance of the song is just heartbreaking," says Gracey. "She worked with Benj and Justin tirelessly to get it just right. It was never just about hitting the notes but about hitting the emotions and she did that so beautifully."

One of the other important women surrounding P.T. Barnum was one of the world's very first global superstars: Jenny Lind, who could be equated with the Lady Gaga of her day. Born Johanna Maria Lind in 1820, she was revered in Europe for her acrobatic soprano voice. But it was Barnum who made her an absolute mega-celebrity in America. No one in the nation had heard her sing a note when Barnum signed an 18-month contract with Lind, but he promoted, advertised and gleefully hyped her style and reputation until audiences could wait not one second more to experience her in her glory. 40,000 people greeted her arrival in the U.S., and Lind performed 93 large-scale concerts, drawing unprecedented crowds. As it turned out, the hype was real and Lind wowed audiences, igniting hysteria later echoed in the Beatles, though she and Barnum would eventually part ways. (Her mark on the world still stands with towns named after her and in the Jenny Lind Crib, featuring the spindled style of wood that she prized.)

Taking on the role of an icon who gave birth to the modern idea of icons is up-and-coming leading lady Rebecca Ferguson, who is herself Swedish-born. Ferguson has come to the fore in roles ranging from Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation to Girl On The Train, but this was not like anything she's done previously. Gracey says that Ferguson took on Lind's glittering persona with a stunning ease: "I felt that working with Rebecca must be what it was like working with Rita Hayworth. She's like an old-school movie star, with that kind of allure," the director muses. "She was just electric as Jenny Lind must have been."

Ferguson loved researching Lind's life and times. "I discovered that people actually fainted when Jenny walked onto the stage. She was a true star and she arrived in America with this air of mystery that people loved," she describes. "It must have been like being at the top of the pop charts." For all her searching, Ferguson was unable to hear Lind's voice, since Lind's fame came before recorded sound. "I wished I could hear her, but this is a modern, musical take on the story, which I love," she notes.

Likewise, not much is known of what exactly drove Jenny Lind to make her unlikely alliance with P.T. Barnum, but Ferguson developed her own reasons. "I think that even though she's a woman who has received hundreds of offers in her time, Barnum offers her something no one else ever has," she reflects. "He tells her, 'I want to give audiences something real,' and that is what she responds to and what creates their bond. He sees what is missing from her life and gives her a chance to express herself authentically."

This sentiment comes out in Lind's main song, "Never Enough." "I think that song is saying the world is great and grand and rich and beautiful, but you've just awoken something else in me, and it isn't enough, but take my hand and let's travel the path," says Ferguson.

Working with Jackman turned that concept into a flesh-and-blood reality. "When Hugh put Barnum's jacket and smile on, it was easy to see exactly why anyone would want to be a part of Barnum's world. I wanted to be a part of Hugh Jackman's world because it's so intoxicating," Ferguson comments.

Even so, a daunting challenge lay ahead. Ferguson has never performed in a musical - but she leapt into the opportunity. She recalls the exhilaration of her first number: "I'd been practicing and rehearsing the song for a while -- but there's nothing like doing it on a stage before 400 extras! Muscles I didn't know I had were shaking. Yet I could see Michael's calmness, and I was thinking, 'you bet on me, so I'm going to do this.' After a few takes I started feeling comfortable and realized I really liked it. But it was more complicated than anything I've ever been involved in - so much goes into coordinating all the shots with the music, the timing and most of all, with the story's emotions."

LOVE IN THE AIR: THE PROTEGE AND THE AERIALIST

Though much of The Greatest Showman is drawn from the outlines of P.T. Barnum's life, two fictional characters bring in fresh points of view: Zac Efron's Phillip Carlyle, the sophisticated man of the theatre who quits his upper-crust life to join the circus - and becomes Barnum's ringmaster protege; and Zendaya's Anne Wheeler, the daring, taboo-breaking, pink-haired aerialist for whom Carlyle falls headlong. Says songwriter Justin Paul: "Zac and Zendaya are a dynamo pair for the ages. Zendaya is so powerful as a young woman and has such an amazing work ethic. And Zac has that movie star quality that only certain people on this earth have, but he's also just super-fun and has an outstanding voice."

Efron is no stranger to musicals, having come to the fore in the High School Musical series and in the feature film version of Hairspray. But he is best known as one of the fastest-rising screen stars of his youthful generation, most recently seen opposite The Rock in the Baywatch reboot. Efron was instantly attracted to The Greatest Showman as "a merging of worlds." He explains: "I love that even though the story is set in the 1870s, there's a real modern sensibility and it's about issues that mean a lot to us today. I thought the script was incredibly creative and done in a way I've never seen before."

Carlyle also intrigued him. "Phillip Carlyle is someone who has grown up very privileged, but he's not happy where he's at and he feels very sort of caged in and jaded," Efron explains. "I think he's lost sight of who he is inside his success, and he's searching for something more. Then he meets Barnum and he sees that P.T. just doesn't care what people think. He doesn't follow the rules society has set and he celebrates that same spirit in his shows. It's liberating for Phillip and the beginning of a great friendship."

Michael Gracey was gratified by Efron's devotion to the project. "Zac came onto this film very early and was a huge supporter of the film. He knew exactly who Phillip is and how he wanted to play him. And it was amazing to give him the chance to put back on his dancing shoes and sing for audiences. People don't realize that his voice is so incredible. In the recording studio, he blew everyone away. But most of all what Zac brought is a genuine rapport with Hugh. They really clicked and they had that true element of friendship and the mentor-student relationship. They pushed each other to their best."

For Efron, Carlyle's first experience in Barnum's circus is one of a man having the haze lifted from his eyes. "There's just this burst of life that he's never experienced. It's like he's opened a door and he's seeing the world with all of its true colors for the first time. It's a real epiphany for him," he describes.

It becomes more than an epiphany when his eyes meet those of aerialist Anne Wheeler; it becomes a romantic longing beyond words and outside the bounds of the era's prejudices and injustices. Some of the most luminescent stars of Barnum's shows were the trapeze artists - whose literally high-flying lives sparked many to dream of pushing limits. In Wheeler, Carlyle sees someone brave and thrilling, but the fact that she is African-American puts their love in a prohibited zone at the very start.

Says Efron: "Although Phillip's feelings for Anne are completely real and justified, they're also forbidden by society at that time and it's really sad. That was a very different time -- though even today, social boundaries and differences go on preventing love and preventing people from uniting with one another. The big breakthrough for Phillip, I think, is that moment he realizes that you don't have to live within the constraints that everyone else has drawn. You don't have to follow rules that are wrong. You don't have to color inside the lines. You can be your own person."

The character gave Efron the chance to get caught up in the kind of cinematic moment that most inspires him. "Falling in love in a musical number on camera is one of my absolute favorite things to do in the world," he confesses. "I'm not ashamed to say it. I know it's pretend but when you get to live in that kind of moment for a scene or two, it feels amazing. It brings you back to Gene Kelly and Singin' In The Rain. Are there any better ways to express true love than in song?"

Playing opposite Efron as Anne Wheeler is another fast-ascending young star: Zendaya, the singer and actress most recently seen as Michelle Jones in Spider-man: Homecoming. Zendaya knew right away the role was for her - especially because Anne is a natural leader of the so-called Oddities." "To me, Anne is very confident, very poised and very comfortable in her own skin, at least when it comes to being in the circus. I think that's what the circus does for all the Oddities. It allows them a place where they can believe in themselves, where they can experience respect and love and have a safe space to be who they are."

She too was drawn to the love story, especially because it was honest about the obstacles inter-racial lovers faced for so long in America. "It's tragic that Anne and Phillip's can't love each other in the way they long to literally due to the color of their skin," Zendaya says. "At the time, it would have been dangerous, so most of what they can do is just exchange looks. For Anne, it's especially hard because she's dealt with racism all her life and now she's slowly falling in love with the exact kind of person she always thought hated her. But love is not something you control. Love just happens to you."

Zendaya dove into training, spending months working with professional aerialists, gaining upper body and core strength and taming fear. "My body has been through a lot, and I've had lots of bruises and soreness to show for it," she laughs, "but it's been so worth it, especially seeing Michael's vision come to life. I never in my entire life thought that I would be flying around in the air but I'm very proud of myself, because I tried my best and came way out of my comfort zone. Now, I'm no longer afraid of heights!

Naturally, Zendaya looked forward to the singing and dancing, one of her life's own great passions. She especially loved working with Keala Settle in the song "This Is Me." "I know there are young women and young men out there who need to hear that message - to hear that even if I'm bruised, I can be brave and I'm who I'm meant to be. I found the words really cool," she says.

Though Efron has some movie musical chops, he notes that the dancing he and Zendaya do on The Greatest Showman was on another level. "This was some of the most technical choreography I've ever attempted in my entire life," he confesses. "To prepare for it, I watched a lot of musicals. I watched Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, even Michael Jackson because of the way he always told a story with his dancing. And then we rehearsed and rehearsed and rehearsed -- and then we rehearsed more!"

His favorite number is their star-crossed duet, "Rewrite the Stars." "It's not your typical choreography and we do some pretty crazy acrobatics. Zendaya was remarkably skilled at trapeze by this point and we were doing aerial stunts, swinging around the room, not even using harnesses. Luckily, nothing went wrong - and it turned out to be really beautiful and unique. I think of it as being Cirque du Soleil meets Shakespeare in a way."

For Hugh Jackman, Zendaya was a thrilling addition to the cast. "She's a true star, but also a true hard worker," he describes. "When she dances, even though she's with twenty of the best dancers in the world, your eye goes straight to her, and when she sings it is something so pure. When I did my sessions with her, Benj and Justin would tell me 'try it this way,' but with Zendaya, they just let her go."

The love story between Phillip and Anne also involves a 3rd party - Anne's brother and aerial partner, W.D. Wheeler, portrayed by Yahya Abdul-Mateen, II (forthcoming Aquaman, The Get Down).

Abdul-Mateen was attracted to the story's themes. "To me, it's a story about people in love with the possibility of being the most that they can be," he says. "My character W.D. sees the circus as his chance to come alive and to share his gift with the world, along with his sister."

Abdul-Mateen found a rich rapport with Zendaya. "W.D. and Anne are family and they have only each other, so protection is a big theme between us," he explains. "As trapeze artists, they have to trust one another and as brother and sister, they always stick together."

THE ODDITIES

When P.T. Barnum starts his American Museum, he goes in search of a cast of characters who might inspire awe and astonishment and put museumgoers in mind of fairy tale stories and myths. The Greatest Showman reveals this unusual group of performers not as strange monsters but as unseen wonders, for the depths of their humanity and the triumph of their self-expression. They include: Lettie Lutz The Bearded Lady, Lentini the Three-Legged Man, General Tom Thumb, The Lord of Leeds, Dog Boy, the conjoined twins Chang and Eng and the Albino Dancers.
Though the existence of such performers was not without major moral controversies and ethical misgivings, Michael Gracey saw their stories as being more complex and their experience worthy of exploration. Early on, Gracey took all the actors portraying the Oddities aside and told them: "You are the heart of the show. You should recognize this show is circled around who you are and what you represent."

Recalls Keala Settle, who takes the role of Lettie Lutz, the Bearded Woman: "We all kind of sat back and looked at each other, and it made me just swell with pride and a lot of joy because it was giving us all a chance to step out, just as P.T. Barnum gives people a chance in the film."

Settle is a Hawaii-born Maori singer and actor who took Broadway by storm in "Hands on a Hardbody," for which she garnered a Tony nomination. She saw the role of the anachronistic Bearded Lady as one that could speak to greater acceptance in today's world. "Lettie Lutz is representative of several women who become a part of P.T Barnum's traveling circus because of the rarity of their physical disorders - which you see them turn into a beautiful thing that you can celebrate. The story shows Barnum's world as a way for someone like Lettie to find a home."

Though the idea of what constitutes an "Oddity" changes from era to era, Settle notes that intolerance and self-belief remain battles in 2017. "It's the human condition," she observes. "We're always striving to be a more enlightened version of ourselves, so we don't always accept who we are in all of our imperfections. What's beautiful to me is that this film celebrates how different each of us is meant to be and the idea that whoever you are or whatever you look like, you are created full of potential."

Still, when Gracey asked Settle to sing solo for "This is Me," she says it took a bottle of Jameson to get her to agree to be so vulnerable and open. The words struck a close nerve. "The song is very hard for me to get through," she confesses, "because there are so many times that I don't believe it myself. I had to kind of pull out away from it at times, and just think of the character so that later I could see what I need to learn personally from that. There is a strength that this character has that I don't have yet. But I also saw the opportunity bring a soft side to her because that's who I am and I'm grateful for that. 'This is Me' means so much to me as a song because it's about something I fight every day."

Says Zac Efron: "Every single time I watched Keala perform, I was just awestruck. She gives it her all every time and it's coming from somewhere inside. Like she's no longer afraid of who she is and I hope that this movie gets people excited about that. Her performance is inspiring and its badass."
Concludes Jackman: "Keala Settle is so astonishing that I don't think anyone can ever sing that song again, because she owns it. It's a beautiful song that is about owning who you really are with your head held high and it seems to resonate with everyone who hears it."

BEYOND PERIOD: PHOTOGRAPHY AND DESIGN

As with the songs for The Greatest Showman, the design aesthetic hybridizes the vintage and the new - hurtling the 19th century of P.T. Barnum into the future we now live inside. Along with a team of dedicated artisans - including cinematographer Seamus McGarvey, production designer Nathan Crowley and costume designer Ellen Mirojnick - Michael Gracey established a look that is not grounded in any particular era. Rather, it is grounded in the power of the imagination of every era, bridging the gap between Barnum's times and our own.
His process kicked off with literally painting most of the film. Gracey explains: "There's an incredible artist called Joel Chang who I work with on everything I do. What he creates is much looser than a storyboard, yet it gives a more cinematic view. Joel and I went through the entire film and he did a painting for every single shot. Those pictures then became the starting point of the work with Seamus and Nathan. It was a wonderful way to show them visually everything that was in my head."

In a sign of more enlightened times, Gracey had another bottom-line in bringing the 19th Century circus world to life: to capture all the pageantry and showmanship that Barnum conjured without using any of the live animals that were then exploited for entertainment. The VFX innovators at Culver City's Moving Picture Company (MPC) created the majesty of the animals from the digital ether. "It was really important to me to not have any live-action animals in this film," says Gracey. "MPC did an incredible job making you believe in our animals without any concerns about cruelty."

Seamus McGarvey, known especially for his transporting and award-winning work on Atonement and Anna Karenina, loved the film's beyond-period approach. "What Michael wanted is a vivid, contemporary vibe," he describes. "We all agreed it should feel very relevant to the here and now - and we had great fun with that idea, consciously using camera movements and colors you never see in period films. We worked with digital cameras and a very modern, saturated palette. There's also a humor in the design that gives it a twist -- it constantly defies any notions of a stuffy period film."

Things got even more exciting when Gracey started showing McGarvey the choreography. McGarvey knew he wanted to break away from the expected movie-musical conventions, and to make the camera more kinetic, fluid and inside-the-moves than usual. "The choreography is extraordinary and it is by no means faithful to period dance of that time. It's absolutely modern so that was my inspiration for moving the camera. I've loved the experimentation that the choreography has afforded," he says.

Gracey and McGarvey even rehearsed the camera moves - all so that full spontaneity could break out when the cameras were rolling for real. "The extended rehearsal process gave us the time to try a lot of different ideas," says Gracey. "In that space, we could just purely be creative. Then, at nighttime what we would go through that footage, get a few hours sleep and return again, having learned a lot."

Shooting "A Million Dreams," the pressure was on. "We really wanted to open the film saying to the audience, 'You're in for a show here. You're in for something special,'" says McGarvey. He followed his instincts into playing with shadows, the natural phenomenon that begat photography. "To show Barnum's childhood imagination, we focus on his love of conjuring images out of nothing, out of a candle casting a shadow across a wall, which is really the essence of all entertainment," he observes.

Another favorite for McGarvey is "Come Alive." "This number transforms into faster and faster movement, so we used a Steadicam that literally bursts in through doors," he explains. "It's an uplifting, shout-it-out-loud song, and our camera operator, Maceo Bishop, moved like a dancer with his Steadicam."

For shooting inside Barnum's American Museum, McGarvey utilized cranes. "We used a 50-foot techno-crane, which can extend out quite quickly and retract back, affording us the most dynamic shots. The camera is able to kind of envelop all the dancers and it's very powerful emotionally on screen. It gives us height when we want it, and allows us to plunge from high to low," he explains.

The buoyant feeling and aerial work of "Rewrite the Stars" put McGarvey in mind of a Chagall painting. "I was thinking of Chagall's images of floating lovers, so in love that they are seemingly filled with helium and weightless," he says. "We also created a wonderful effect where Phillip and Anne are spinning around on the trapeze and the camera is in the center of the ring spinning with them, resulting in this lovely blur behind them. You have the feeling of the two of them lost in their own connectedness."

Throughout the shoot, says McGarvey, Gracey kept telling him to "be brave, to be dramatic and bold in the lighting." "His encouragement led to us always trying different things we might never have otherwise tried," he explains.

To create maximum flexibility, McGarvey worked with multiple 65 mm digital cameras, using the latest large sensors. "These sensors are a new development and the images are extraordinary, not only for wider, epic shots, which now have incredible detail and vivacity in the shadows, but also for close-ups, which we could shoot in a way that reminds me of medium-format portraiture," he describes. "The extreme wide shots let you witness the dancing in all its glory. And then the close ups are really emotional. We also play with depth of field, and with filtration by using this filter I call Glimmerglass. Digital can look very sharp, but that is not what we wanted with this film. We wanted points of light to kind of bloom and give it a romantic edge, almost like a varnish."

The design work of Nathan Crowley brought McGarvey into the intricate mechanics of shooting detailed miniatures turned into a large-scale New York City. "The film is set in the world of the imagination, so the miniatures fit with that idea and it's also a part of embracing theatrical elements, another key to the look of our movie," says McGarvey. Adds Gracey: "Miniatures are kind of a dying art, but they're some of my most favorite shots in the film."


With all the complexity of the shots, both vast and intimate, much of the film was pre-visualized. Yet even with massive amounts of prep, McGarvey says it was vital to be open at every moment to random accidents. "If you are open to accidents, sometimes great inspiration comes out of them," he says. "Even unintentional blurs can create an unexpected dynamism. And that's the wonderful thing about cinema - right through the editing and post-production you are finding the best way to tell the story."

Production designer Crowley, Oscar-nominated for his otherworldly work on The Prestige, The Dark Knight and Interstellar, also pushed his edges. Though known for his innovative work with director Christopher Nolan (most recently on Dunkirk), Crowley has never designed a musical. But he could not resist the subject matter of The Greatest Showman. "The chance to create a large world around the birth of the circus and the birth of what will become show business was something phenomenal," Crowley says.

Right away, he leapt out into a hybrid Steampunk-modern-fantasy-pop-show vibe that emphasizes the futuristic innovations of the 19th Century, from Tesla's experiments with electricity to newfangled elevated trains. "I was interested in the great emphasis on futurism at the time, with the big glass houses in New York, London and Paris - and all the new societal possibilities being explored through technology and the arrival of mass electricity," says Crowley. "Although Barnum's museum actually opened pre Civil War, in our fictional musical we pushed it just a bit into the Industrial Age, so that you have steam and gas and electricity and you can really feel that spirit of rapidly changing times not unlike our own."

Crowley envisioned a look that would not be nostalgic but instead re-animate the past, to make it fully alive in 2017 as if via a time machine. "One of the early things we discussed with Michael is the film looking like hand-tinted photographs with a sort of surreal feel to it. We talked about then losing the depth of field so that the color was vibrant and stylized."

He got his first chance to go out on a creative limb with "A Million Dreams," using 3-D printers in unforeseen ways. "The heart of that song is an abandoned mansion that becomes its own fantastical, childhood world," Crowley explains. "Since we created the ruined mansion practically, we had to come up with a way of projecting surreal shadows across the set. So we turned to the 3-D printers to make objects that can project a hand-painted animated image when you move a light across them. The work on that sequence was almost sculptural, which made it very, very interesting for me."

Gracey loved watching the design team merge cutting-edge and old-school techniques for "A Million Dreams." He recalls: "For the rooftop scene, Joel Chang painted a wonderful 360-degree backdrop and then Nathan and his incredible team of scenic artists figured out how to lay out the enormous canvas. It was exciting as painters don't usually get to create backdrops of this scale anymore."

"A lot of it was remembering how creatively things used to be done," continues Crowley. "We were punching holes for windows and using ink so we could get a backlit sky and lighting a giant moon from the backing. I think it adds a rich romanticism to the whole scene."

That number also incorporates the striking, meticulously crafted miniature of New York City. "The camera has to skim over 1800s New York with the Hudson River in the background to Barnum's rooftop and we knew from the beginning we wanted to do it with a miniature," Crowley explains. "I've been using 3-D printers for a few years now and I find them super-exciting so we thought we'd just go for it. We ran 8 printers around the clock to create about 500 New York buildings and then we hand-painted each of them. It was very laborious but it was also great fun to be able to control that shot so intricately."

The coup de grace for Crowley was the re-creation of Barnum's museum of wonders, stuffed to the gills with taxidermy, wax figures, dioramas and live exhibits. Located at the corner of Broadway and Ann Street (where a Zara store now stands), the original museum featured a "natural history" display on the bottom level, with a theater on top. To bring it back to life in a new way, Crowley and his team built an extensive set in Brooklyn at Capsys, an old brick factory, now owned by Steiner Studios. The scale of the building and the surrounding studios served as a kind of updated version of the massive Hollywood backlot for the design team. "The way Nathan used and transformed that entire space is so clever," says Gracey. "Like Barnum, Nathan can picture beyond what a place is to see the world it can be."

For Crowley the Capsys building could not have been more serendipitous. "It allowed us to build a double height space," he notes. "I didn't want to have to shrink the set so we took the red brick of the building and added a sort of Victorian steel structure to it with a balcony that allowed us to put in trapezes, high-wires and cameras without replacing the whole ceiling. On a typical soundstage, we could not have looked up into the ceiling with the camera as we do."

Crowley designed three increasingly dynamic phases of the museum set. Phase one is the static museum filled with immobile displays. But phase two and three bring in more live acts and circus performers who emerge from a majestic, painted proscenium. The building also becomes home to the performers so that when the museum catches fire (which happened in real life), it is devastating. It is not only the loss of the performers' livelihoods, it also endangers their fragile community.

More creative touches came on the number "Rewrite The Stars." "For that song, we ended up doing a scenic moon on the floor using different-colored sand," Crowley explains. "Rather than use paint, we painted with sand. And that was also something I've never done before."

The film's climax sees Barnum's invention of the "big tent circus" (which was erected in the Marcy Armory in Brooklyn) but Crowley hints at the coming arrival of the tent earlier. "There are some clues of the tent in the museum set," the production designer points out. "You start to see that classic, red-and-gold motif as banners and rings come into this Victorian space. You start to see it all coming together as you transition from what was a museum to the live excitement of the canvas-top."

Among the dozens of historic locations utilized by the film are the Woolworth mansion in Glen Cove, Long Island; Cedar Oak Beach in Babylon, Long Island; the Prospect Park boathouse; the Brooklyn Academy of Music where Rebecca Ferguson took the stage as Jenny Lind; the Tweed Courthouse; the Old Westbury Gardens on Long Island; the Marshall Field Estate in Lloyd Harbor, NY and the James Duke house on East 78th Street (now part of New York University).

The chance to shoot in New York lends the film something inimitable says Gracey. "New York has a live-wire creative energy you can't imitate. And of course, there's an incredible attraction to New York City for artists and so you have an incredible pool of artists to draw on. Most of all, the locations were such fertile ground for our cast and crew. New York has the spectacle Barnum loved."

Indeed, the opportunity to shoot the film in the city where Barnum originally turned his imaginings into a world-altering reality had a galvanizing impact on cast and crew. "I think it helped make the impossible feel possible," sums up Gracey. "It was such an inspiration to be able to shoot in buildings that were part of the city when Barnum was making his mark in it."

EMOTION AND HIGH FASHION: THE COSTUMES

Just as the production design team was liberated from period conventions, so too was costume designer Ellen Mirojnick, an Emmy winner for Behind the Candelabra, who says the costumes for The Greatest Showman were the creative challenge of a lifetime. "We took a more fantastical approach with a look that is more like a fashion spread," she says. "The goal was to put the audience in a fantastic mood of romance and joy rather than aim at cold, historical accuracy. We not only created a hybrid of time periods and looks, we actually tried to create another category entirely."

Mirojnick, known for exploring the borders where art, fashion and film cross, thrilled Michael Gracey with her outside-the-box designs. "Ellen worked tirelessly to create a wardrobe that has elements that are sometimes contemporary, sometimes period, sometimes high fashion and always colorful in a way that can go beyond the world of the 1800s to excite modern audiences," says Gracey.

There was not much prep time but Mirojnick relied on an army of talented craftspeople who worked at top speed. Nearly all the clothes were hand-made for the film (with a handful of purchased pieces, which were taken apart and reimagined). "We created our own little 'miracle factory,'" says Mirojnick. "We put together a really good team of shoppers, stitchers, cutters and tailors who made our dreams come true. The motto for all of us was to keep taking risks and try absolutely everything."

The first big test for Mirojnick was P.T. Barnum himself. "I love to design men's clothes more than I love anything else in the entire world," admits Mirojnick. "So to create a silhouette for Hugh as Barnum was a deep pleasure, especially because he can carry everything and anything. He can just put something on and become the character in ways beyond what you imagined."

Barnum's silk and wool ringmaster look, replete with a deep red jacket, was cut and tailored to Jackman's torso by master tailor D. Barak Stribling. Says Mirojnick: "It's not the typical squared-off ringmaster look. It's more the shape of a coat that wraps around Hugh's body, accentuating his legs and dance movements." As Barnum gains success, Mirojnick gave him a more dandy-ish, peacock look, exemplified by the green-and-purple, windowpane-pattern suit he dons when he meets Queen Victoria. The fabrics were actually all sourced from current British menswear. "These are fabrics you could buy right now on Oxford Street," Mirojnick notes. Mirojnick also created a blue velvet suit for the ending of the film - its lush color chosen to compliment Jackman's eyes in the most romantic of ways.

All the film's men were given body-conscious jackets, high-waisted, slim-legged pants, closely cropped vests and tailored English shirts. "If it looks great, it's right, was the only rule," says Mirojnick.

Zac Efron was another joy for the team to dress. "He has a graceful, dancer's body," observes New York costume designer Patrick Wiley, "like Nureyev." When Barnum passes the torch to Phillip, Efron sports an outfit that includes a green velvet jacket, two different plaids, a white shirt and a red tie -- a look that suggests carving out a freer future beyond the staid Victorian past.

Charity Barnum's look evokes classic romance in hues of lavender, pink and blush - and features a silhouette that is a mash-up of styles from the turn of the century to the 30s to 2017. A favorite for Mirojnick is Charity's dress for the "Tightrope" number, which glows on screen with its crystal-pleated, powder-blue chiffon. "It's an iconic look that could be Ginger Rogers or it could be in Dr. Zhivago or any of those romantic solitaire moments of a lonely lady finding love and beauty again," she says.

Diverging from Charity is Jenny Lind, whose style reflects both the liberating grandness of the new world of mass entertainment and the timelessness of a worldwide icon. "We felt Jenny Lind had to be highly dramatic. So with some creative license, we pushed her limits to show how different she was from Charity," explains Mirojnick. "They are two very attractive women, but they are contrasts in drama and softness. Jenny's clothes are all very strong and structured. There's not anything soft about her."

Lind's performance dresses echo the sophisticated lines of the House of Dior's iconic mid Century New Look - which brought the hourglass shape to flowing heights - mixed with dashes of the Golden Age of Hollywood. "When Rebecca sang 'Never Enough,' and I saw how Seamus lit that dress, I almost fell over. I could not believe how gorgeous she was," recalls Mirojnick "That particular dress is a combination of both couture and a couple of pieces found in the back room of a bridal shop."

Each dress was custom-fitted to Ferguson. "Everything was designed to reflect Rebecca's beauty, the paleness of her skin, the redness of her hair. She just wowed us," says Mirojnick. Ferguson was equally wowed by the work of the team. Says Ferguson: "The costumes that Ellen created could be on the cover of Elle or Vogue next month, they are that fashionable."

The costuming team was able to really let go with Anne Wheeler, the aerialist whose outfits mirror whimsy, youth and defiant freedom. Her signature colors are turquoise, purple, silver and gold -- a theatrical look that goes to the edge of creativity without becoming garish. "We found that purple was a great color for both Zendaya and for Yahya as W.D. They're a matched set, which is something trapeze families have often done through history," Mirojnick notes. "That color also suits flight. Michael then had the idea to add a fluid, lavender fabric behind Zendaya to make her even more visually exciting."

Zendaya's dress for "Rewrite the Stars" has a vintage lingerie influence, featuring a silk camisole and red briefs trimmed with lace and period buttons. "It's purposely very difficult to place these outfits in any single period of time. Instead, we hope one gets swept up in the emotion, the music and the life of the characters so that you are transported to a kind of alternate world," says Mirojnick. "There's a fun innocence to Anne's rehearsal dress in that number - it's both a nod to the past and to our present."

The costumes had that transformational effect on Zendaya. She says: "The costumes are super creative and detail-oriented, but they also are an inspiration for us to better understand our characters."

For Keala Settle's Lettie Lutz, Mirojnick looked to John Galliano's 21st Century take on Dior's New Look: "Galliano inspired us because he did his own crazy spin on the New Look and there is a rhythm to his clothes that is just really luscious and inspiring." She adds: "Working with Keala was amazing because she would stand in her fittings and cry because she couldn't believe that she'd ever have anything custom-made for her, something that would express her in this way. It was a totally new experience for her and it was great to see Keala and Lettie Lutz brought together."

Adding more details to the characters is the work of makeup and hair heads Nicki Ledermann and Jerry Popolis, respectively. They worked closely with Mirojnick and Gracey, putting deep thought into every character, especially the Oddities. "We wanted audiences to see their humanity and not get too distracted by any prosthetic makeup. The creative challenge was to emphasis how human they are," explains Ledermann. Adds Popolis: "We really wanted everyone to look beautiful. The Oddities aren't scary; they're gorgeous creatures."

For Gracey, it was a marvel to see his cast suddenly transform after the months of rehearsal. "We'd been working with these sweaty people for months and suddenly they looked like a million dollars," he laughs. "The wardrobe, the hair and the makeup were all so classy and so right. I felt that each person could look in the mirror at their look and know exactly who their character is."

CHOREOGRAPHING A MODERN CIRCUS: ASHLEY WALLEN

The of-the-moment energy of Pasek and Paul's songs in turn inspired the show-stopping choreography of Ashley Wallen, who brought his own modern, rhythmic take on Barnum's world. An Australian best known for his work with a variety of rock and pop performers, Wallen has worked with Michael Gracey before on commercials and videos. Now he relished the chance to up his game.

"This is the best work that Ashley's ever done," says Gracey. "He was so inventive and his work brings our characters to life in a way that it isn't only about cool dance steps. He has helped each of the characters express themselves uniquely, with a different style of dance for Hugh, Zendaya, Zac and everyone. He also really plays to people's strengths. He knows how to empower people in their movements. He makes people feel so confident that they do the best dancing they've ever done in their lives. It was fun to see every cast member be awed by what they achieved."

Says Pasek of what Wallen brings: "Ashley's choreography is kind of like New York City in that it pulses. It's kinetic and a little bit gritty and has a kind muscular sensibility, but it also comes from a clear place of character and it just feels very, very alive."

Hugh Jackman believes Barnum himself would have approved of the bravado of the choreography "Barnum would definitely want the music and dance in any film involving him to be cutting edge. That was his motivation in everything. Everything has to evolve and change. Ash's stuff brings that quality of something fresh and new, and you just haven't seen anything like this."

Jackman also notes that Wallen pushed him to new places. "Choreographers can be very kind, but when you get in the room to rehearse, there's something kind of sadistic about them, and they really love to punish you," he laughs." I did things, dance wise here, that I've never done before. I like to work hard, but I did wish my legs were twenty years younger. I kept saying, 'Ash, I'm not sure if I can get there." And Ash would just say 'You'll get there.' So I worked really hard but I really enjoyed it, in part because the style that he was creating was so modern and cool."

Even Barnum's stovepipe hat became a chance to gain new skills, as Jackman learned to expertly juggle the accessory. Says Wallen: "In 'Come Alive,' Hugh flips the hat, catches it in one hand and lands it on his head. He's the first person I've worked with who could accomplish that. He practices and practices and practices. We'd see him standing in a room doing it over and over until he had it. By the time we shot, he could do it eight times in a row, just boom, boom, boom. I don't know how!"

"Come Alive" was especially exciting for Gracey. "We had to find a balance between the choreography and the more dramatic beats because there's a lot going on in this song. There's the evolution of the circus, the fear of the Oddities for the very first time stepping out into the limelight and then the acceptance of the audience. There's also P.T. Barnum realizing that all of these things he's put in place are starting to work, and that he's literally created this living dream, but also there's something missing. So, there's a lot playing out over the course of this one number that had to be expressed."

Wallen says he approached each song as its own complete story with its own individual style. "For example, 'A Million Dreams' is a very intimate rooftop dance, which I saw as a throwback to Fred and Ginger musicals. On the other hand, 'This is Me' is very, very contemporary, but 'Come Alive' is more like a big, old-school studio number. I really wanted to give each number its own genre and feel."

For "Rewrite the Stars," Wallen worked with Circus Coordinator Mathieu Leopold. "Mathieu coordinated the aerial stuff, while I concentrated on the ground," he explains. "But we all worked to twine it all together. Zendaya was absolutely amazing at the trapeze stuff. I actually had a go at what she was doing on the hoop and I couldn't do it - and she had to sing at the same time!"

Adds Gracey: "I wanted 'Rewrite the Stars' to be a unique love song, and also unique in terms of its movement. There's a lot of wirework and we did occasionally use doubles but 90% of it is Zac and Zendaya. The two of them trained so hard to make that number work. Zendaya had blisters on her hands but you never heard her complain once. She is just hardcore."

Wallen worked closely with Michelle Williams to prepare her for her big dance moment on the song "Tightrope." "It's a beautiful but challenging number where she is dancing with the shadow of Barnum and we rehearsed it for 8 weeks," he notes. "She trained intently and progressed so far. I loved watching her open up as a dancer and I think she was shocked at how much she was able to do."

Also exciting for Wallen was working with Seamus McGarvey behind the camera. "When you watch those old musicals the camera is pretty static but Seamus totally made each number into huge, cinematic moments," the choreographer muses.

It all culminates in the film's climactic reprise of "The Greatest Show." "We left our biggest dance for the end," says Wallen. "We kind of tease it at the opening but at the end we're now in the three-ring circus and there is so much going on I can't even begin to explain it all! It's just huge number that incorporates all the circus acts, all the dancers, all the Oddities, the digital animals and so much more. It's created to be a big, astounding, celebratory final note."

The passion and effort put into the film by every single person involved, from Hugh Jackman to the grips and gaffers, was incredibly moving for Gracey to witness on his first feature. "We had such an incredible atmosphere on this production," he reflects. "It was a privilege for me to be surrounded by an entire cast and crew who were united in wanting this to be something more than just another film. And Hugh was always leading it because he everyday he was so passionate and so generous and so full of joy to just get to work and bring his best, which all goes back to the story's themes."

Sums up Laurence Mark: "We all hope to have created a feast for the eyes, for the ears and for the heart. The old Barnum & Bailey circus's time has come and gone, but what lives on as the legacy of Barnum is that desire to spark joy and imagination, and that's the tradition we hope to have honored."

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