DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE Director Talks About Channing Tatum's Gambit Experience - "Channing Was Visibly Emotional Every Day"
Deadpool & Wolverine director Shawn Levy recently opened up about bringing Channing Tatum in to finally play Gambit in a Marvel movie. Levy also revealed that he was one of the filmmakers in contention to direct the solo Gambit movie that was in development several years ago.
Tatum playing Remy Lebeau was one of the highlights of the film as he played the character perfectly and it was a hilarious take on it.
Tatum shows up in the film as a part of a small team that also consists of Wesley Snipes (Blade), Jennifer Garner (Elektra), and Dafne Keen (X-23).
Logan (Hugh Jackman) and Deadpool (Reynolds) team up with them while they are stranded in the Void to face-off against Cassandra Nova's (Emma Corrin) forces so that they can escape and get back home.
During an interview with the New York Times, Levy spoke about working with Tatum, revealing that the actor was emotional every day shooting his scenes.
Levy said: "Channing was visibly emotional every day on set. Sometimes it was in the form of smiling euphoria and sometimes it was tearful gratitude, but I’ve never seen an actor more grateful to be on set than Channing Tatum.
“I was one of several dozen directors who interviewed to direct the Gambit movie over a decade ago, and the first time Ryan and I pitched Kevin Feige [the Marvel Studios president] the idea, we had to explain it a bit because this isn’t a capstone to legacy: This is a zig when all the other characters were zagging.
“It also gave an opportunity to cut against the grain of the other characters, because Gambit’s experience is diametrically different than all the other legends."
Ryan Reynolds also shared his gratitude toward Tatum along with some photos from the film. Reynolds said: “Gambit is a guy Chan was born to play. His story is similar to mine in that he spent a decade trying to put the most comic-accurate version of Gambit on the big screen.
“Remy LeBeau is grafted to his soul and needs to come out and deal. And Gambit found his author in Chan. He’s one of the coolest, smartest characters in Comics and still largely unexplored.
“I want more — and from what I saw in theaters, you do too. Having the chance to say goodbye to some of these heroes is as important as having new characters to root for… and rooting for Gambit is easy.
“Rooting for Chan is even easier. He’s one of the greatest, hardest working, kindest people in this entire industry. I couldn’t be more thrilled to see @channingtatum pull Gambit from the dead and bring him to life at the perfect time and perfect way. #Gambit”
While I would love to see Tatum back in the role of Gambit, his appearance in Deadpool & Wolverine is most likely just a one-off, and we will probably never see him play Gambit again. It would be a pleasant surprise if he did, though!