"United 93": Northwest native took an emotional journey to portray a hero of 9/11

Actors have many faces, and Cheyenne Jackson is about to show us a new one. Seattle musical-theater audiences will remember the tall, handsome charmer who sang leading roles at Village Theatre, the 5th Avenue Theatre, Civic Light Opera and other local stages.

Though his roles weren't always light — Tony in "West Side Story" and Berger in "Hair," among others — his presence always made audiences feel better. The man from Spokane had that elusive thing called star quality, and his talent glittered under the lights. When he moved to New York a few years ago and found quick success on Broadway, no one who knew his work was surprised.

But now, as he makes his movie debut, he's in an entirely different world — in a movie commemorating a day that many will be reluctant to remember. In Paul Greengrass' wrenching, sensitive film "United 93," Jackson disappears effortlessly into an ensemble, one of numerous everyday heroes caught in a real-life nightmare.

The movie is a meticulous reenactment of the 90-minute journey of United Airlines Flight 93, the fourth hijacked plane on Sept. 11, 2001. (It opens in several Seattle theaters Friday.) Greengrass created the film with the cooperation of dozens of family members and friends of the 40 passengers and crew of Flight 93. Jackson plays Mark Bingham, the 31-year-old rugby player who was among a group of passengers who fought back against the terrorists.

For an up-and-coming actor making his feature-film debut after a high-profile Broadway stint (he starred in the Elvis-ish musical "All Shook Up"), this was an unusual choice. Questions have surrounded "United 93" since the beginning: Was the tragedy too recent for such a film? Would the emotions it would expose be too raw? In the beginning, Jackson had the same concerns.

"Although I was excited to be doing my first motion picture, I thought it might be too soon," he said. "But the families wanted it to be made, and that's what has guided me for this process: the fact that the families don't think it's too soon. Some don't think it's soon enough."

A hush-hush thing

The process of making "United 93" was unusual from the start; an often emotional journey far different from the stage world to which Jackson, 30, was accustomed. The audition, the actor remembers, was "kind of a hush-hush thing," with hundreds of actors arriving to try out for a movie whose name wasn't revealed. Organized into groups of six, the actors were asked to improvise as passengers on a plane being hijacked. "They just wanted to see how we would respond in the moment, organically," Jackson said.

A few weeks and a few callbacks later, Jackson was on his way to London, facing a daunting challenge: playing a real person — "someone's son, someone's brother, someone's boyfriend." He read numerous articles about Bingham, spoke to family members, printed out every picture of Bingham he could find and taped them to his hotel-room wall. "I just kind of wanted to absorb him, feel his life force," said Jackson quietly.

Sequestered at Pinewood Studios outside London, the cast rehearsed for two weeks, shaping the script through improvisation. Within the known time constraints of the flight (the film unfolds in real time), Greengrass and the cast created an outline and "a sense of order," said Jackson. Some specifics were known, such as precisely what time some passengers made phone calls to loved ones. Others were constructed based on what seemed most plausible.

Dialogue, wherever possible, was based on fact: from cockpit recordings, phone transcripts, depositions and other sources. Costumes were based on what the real people were or might have been wearing that day. Actors mostly did their own stunts, including scenes of violent struggle with the terrorists (four actors who were kept separate from those playing the passengers, until the actual filming). It was an emotional, difficult shoot, done in continuous long takes repeated over and over.

In his room at night, far from the city ("really kind of in the middle of sheep and cow pastures"), Jackson struggled to come to terms with the work. "I slept probably two hours a night while I was filming it," he remembered. "I couldn't stop thinking about Mark and these people. It broke my heart every day. We would do these long, incredibly exhausting takes, covered in fake blood and some real blood, our voices were gone from screaming, so exhausted emotionally. But then at the end of the day we could walk off the plane, wash off our makeup, get some coffee and try to let it all go, and these people [the real passengers] couldn't.

"That is what will stay with me forever. That's why this movie was made. I'm not the same, I don't think I'll ever be the same."

Back to Broadway

Life after "United 93" will likely bring more film work, perhaps of a more conventional nature. Jackson recently spent some time in Los Angeles, and says he's in the running for roles in "a few big movies." Nothing's signed, so he can't name names at the moment. (One that got away: the Tom Cruise-ish lead role in "Scary Movie 4," for which Jackson was one of four finalists. Had he gotten it, he would have played opposite Edmonds native Anna Faris.)

In New York, the near future brings workshops of a musical version of Charles Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities," charitable work (he actively supports several nonprofits and is about to become a spokesperson for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) and, with luck, a visit home to the Northwest. He hopes to perform in Seattle again soon, if his schedule permits.

The journey with "United 93" isn't over: Jackson, who has seen the movie three times ("The first time, I feel like I didn't breathe through 90 minutes"), is planning to slip into a multiplex to watch it again, with an audience. "I'd like to see the responses," he said. "It definitely starts a dialogue, which is exactly what Paul wanted."

But as "A Tale of Two Cities" nears a Broadway run, Jackson's clearly looking forward to returning to more familiar territory, at least for a while. "It'll be good," he said, "to sing and dance again."

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com