The Million Best Things Channing Tatum Has Ever Said

By Maggie Lange

As creatures who are both shallow and judgmental, humans make all sorts of unwarranted associations. We don’t assume a soft, portly gourmand has a nimble logical mind. We don’t assume someone bulky with muscles is a scatter-brained poet. We don’t assume bright eyes and precise gestures are traits of a complete dumb-ass. Especially with our actors—for whom we have invented typecasting—there is an assumption that physicality is tied to personality. And we are wrong a lot!

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The thing is, it feels good to be wrong! Being surprised is wonderful. And one of the most surprising minds in Hollywood is the glorious mind of Channing Tatum. Housed inside the body of an industrious pinup boy is the soul of a cuddly Rube Goldberg machine. His brain is so bonkers, so fun, so curious and worthy of ogling and appreciation.

He seems like a complete goofball! But like a complete goofball who can hang! Like a complete goofball who can hang, and be thoughtfully introspective at the same time. Channing Tatum’s brain is beautiful. It contains multitudes.

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For example: Channing Tatum’s vision of the future is both broadly optimistic and replete with holograms (3 - 4). Channing Tatum’s comprehension of his career is subservient to his role as an entertainer (6 - 8) and freewheeling in his desire to do weird nonsense (9, 10). He is a mind that cannot be fettered by limits of existent language. He invents new words (11-14) and enjoys the liberties of metaphors. He has compared himself to a sponge and a sandcastle (15-16). He has compared his work to sword fighting, playing jazz, doing a backflip off a car, and sculpting with a Greco-Roman discipline (14-19). He cares for the life of the mind (20 - 23) as well as the consumable joys of the earth (24- 28). He does not fear the complications that come with being a person; he does not care to hide anything; he knows that his present self is the sum of his past selves (29-36). He is a person of great, endless joy (1 - 2; 37 - 39).

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*EVIDENTIARY SUPPORT; OR THE 41 BEST THINGS CHANNING TATUM HAS EVER SAID

Channing Tatum on the Big Picture:

“Yeah. Society’s amazing.” (1)

“If everyone is dressed in a thong pretty much any conversation is going to be funny.” (2)

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Channing Tatum on the Future:

“At times it feels like the bottom’s gonna fall out. Just ‘cause I don’t really know how I got here. But I just keep moving forward, and it just keeps getting better and better.” (3)

“There are going to be holograms!” (4)

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Channing Tatum on the Art and Artifice of Acting:

“I’m just starting to wrap my head around how to become a real character. I used to think you always had to be doing something, literally moving, to stay interesting. I’m working on stillness.” (5)

“No one’s calling me for lawyer roles. I still have a lot to do to prove myself.” (6)

“You gotta do the Dear Johns. You gotta do The Vow.” (7)

“We didn’t want to get so over-handed with all the gender stuff, or with everybody’s story, it’s a dancer-stripper movie, we’re not going to try and make it like Lawrence Of Arabia. But we didn’t want there to be no story either. It’s a fine needle to thread.” (8)

“All he had to say was 'Danny McBride,’ 'leash,’ and 'a Mexican wrestling mask.’ It was just the most wrong idea I’d ever heard. 'You’re Danny McBride’s sex slave, you’re like his gimp.’ And I was like, 'All right, I’m in.’ ” (9)

“I’m gonna give it five more years and then say, 'Get me some fat roles, boys!’” (10)

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Channing Tatum on His Unconventional Approach to Self-Expression:

Words invented by Channing Tatum in interviews: “fantastical dansical” (11), “goer” (12), “fappy” (as in fat and happy) (13), dualitied (14).

“I’m constantly a flip-and-flop of extremes. I take care of it, to an extent—and then I kind of knock it all down and destroy the sand castle.” (15)

“I think that’s one thing I’m pretty skilled at. I can look at a person and say, They’ve got something that I want up there in their head. I’m going to do my best to get in there and absorb it. My mom said, 'Be a sponge.’ And so I’ve learned more from people than I have from school or from books.” (16)

“You know when someone is so nervous about something, it makes you doubt yourself? Like on Step Up, I was going to do this backflip off the car. That’s something I do, like, all the time. I just do backflips off things. By the time it was time to do it, I was, like, shaking, because everyone was all, 'Are you sure you want to do this?’ But then I did it, and it was fine.” (17)

“Well there are swords, and two guys are sword fighting. There’s a metaphor there I’m sure.” (18)

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Channing Tatum on Education and Lessons Learned:

“I’ve never studied the classics, but I’d like to. My teacher offered to show me how the Greeks were able to sculpt someone perfectly. From there you can go off and experiment—sort of like jazz. Once you learn to play anything, you can break the form and go and do something even bigger.” (19)

“I got two books on this thing,” [about his Kindle] “about the start and finish of the Roman Empire. I don’t have to read this stuff, but I love it.” (20)

“I think because I’ve had that history of not really being great in school, I probably try to overcompensate. That’s why I try to read so many books. Just so I don’t feel…uneducated.” (21)

“I waxed last time, and I promised myself I was not gonna do it again. And then Matt Bomer goes, 'No, no, you just didn’t have the right lady. She just wasn’t doing it right. And then I went again, and it sucked just as bad.” (22)

“I would have loved to learn things earlier than I did, but then maybe I wouldn’t have gone and done the things that gave me insight into what it is to be human—to have fears and wants. Like the fear of asking a girl out on a date when I can’t afford dinner at Chili’s, so instead maybe we go to Checkers and I make it cool by turning it into a picnic, put the burger’s in a basket of my mom’s and try to make it romantic. That’s the kind of worry I used to have.” (23)

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Channing Tatum on Potables, Gluttony:

“I love nothing more than eating and drinking beer” (24)

Jagermeister is “nectar of the gods.” (25)

“I mean, when can I say I’ve drank the blood of James Franco? Why wouldn’t I go and do that?” (26)

“I feel like I was definitely the fat kid at the buffet. There were four really great projects, and I was 'I wanna do them all.’” (27)

What would he take with him on a desert island? “How about a magical seashell that’s always filled with bourbon. And I would like a magical palm tree that had a lot of shade with instead of coconuts there’s just peanut butter jelly sandwiches with cheetos underneath. And my wife that is always happy and possibly naked.” (28)

If he were a hot dog, and he were starving, would he eat himself? “That’s like a psychological profiling question. Yeah, why not. I like to eat. Let’s just be real about it.” (29)

“I was like, $10 to sit in an air-conditioned place and spray cologne on a piece of paper? Yeah, I’m gonna do that.” (30)

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Channing Tatum on Being Channing Tatum:

After learning thatPeople had named him the Sexist Man Alive: “My first thought was, 'Y'all are messing with me.’” (31)

“I don’t regret one thing. I’m not a person who hides shit.” (32)

“If they don’t like me because I voted for Obama, then fuck them. I like horses and I like Obama. Nothin’ wrong with that.” (33)

“I’m editing nothing. Life is life. I can’t change a thing.” (34)

“It’s only weird if you make it weird.” (35)

“I feel like my voice needs a mustache.” (36)

“Nobody calls me Channing.” (37)

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Channing Tatum on the Expression of Unbridled Joy:

“Tee-hee-hee.” (38)

“Hahahahaha.” (39)

“AAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAHHAAH” ad infinitum. (40)

“Hahahahaha!” (41)

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Gif courtesy of GQ