Fans should expect greatness from Channing Tatum, 42, in the third Magic Mike movie, according to his co-star Salma Hayek, 55. The actress told People that the upcoming male stripper flick will feature a lap dance from Channing that’s unlike anything we’ve seen in the first two films. “If you thought he could dance [before], you are going to realize you haven’t seen anything,” Salma explained in the Aug. 4 interview. “His dance skills—he just got better.”
Salma replaced Thandie Newton as the lead female star in Magic Mike‘s Last Dance, which has wrapped filming. In her interview, Salma revealed some juicy tidbits about the movie. “Look, I’m not going to complain. On an average day, I had to work with 12 strippers. Not one, not two—12,” she shared. “It was still hard work.”
Furthermore, Salma referred to her exciting role in the next Magic Mike movie as “the strongest love story, the strongest female character, from beginning to end. How lucky am I?” Warner Bros. confirmed in November 2021 that Magic Mike 3 was a-go, with Channing returning alongside director Steven Soderberg and writer Reid Carolin.
In February, Channing and Carolin told Variety that the lead female role is crucial to the plot of this sequel. “It’s really about a woman stuck at a horrible strip show like a Chippendales and then realizing, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ ” said Carolin. “And then Magic Mike comes down from the ceiling. She gets to go down the rabbit hole and asks: ‘What do I really want?’ ”
Channing, who is back to play male stripper Mike Lane, also said the Salma’s character is “really strong, almost stronger than Mike … we’ve never done a traditional love story, and this isn’t a traditional love story.”