Channing Tatum, star of the new 22 Jump Street, opened up to GQ magazine about his crazy early days in Hollywood.
Channing Tatum is now a certified A-list star and father, but back in the day, he was just a young punk living the Hollywood dream.
One of Channing Tatum’s earliest movies was a low budget New York drama called A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints. The movie was based on a memoir by the movie’s director Dito Montiel. It was Tatum’s first major role and he was cast alongside another young Hollywood acting prodigy — the performance artist known as Shia LeBouf.
Channing Tatum relives one crazy night that involved drunken debauchery, a broken window, 80s street violence and Shia LeBeouf when he was just kind-of a dick.
“Me and Shia, I think we had just met that day. We were, like, ‘what shall we go out and do?’ We were drinking. And I think our initial thing was ’Alright, let’s go out and try and get in a fight!’ This was just young dumb idiot actors thinking that that’s going to bond us. Because we’ll shed blood together blah blah blah. I’ve never seen him since then. The kid’s an incredible actor…I just wish that he would just act. Just act, man!”
I definitely kicked in a window that night. But it wasn’t Barnes and Nobles. Just a window. I was running.”
We were just running and being hoodlums and throwing trash bags down streets and just being stupid. We were trying to be like eighties hoodlums. And I think as we were running I kicked this thing, not thinking that it would ever shatter. And everything just went raining down. And I was like ‘oh shit’. And then we just took off running.”
We all split up. I think Shia even punched a cop car—we weren’t even sure if the cop was in the car, he punched the window of a cop car. It was pandemonium. It was just one of those nights that the volume just keeps getting turned up, turned up, turned up. And we all split up. We all just ran in opposite directions. I didn’t hide under a car, I dove in some trash bags: ‘I’m sitting here for a little while’. In hindsight it’s the funniest thing in the world—just typical actors trying too hard. It’s only fun because we didn’t get caught…that I can have perspective on it now and know it was stupid. I don’t think we were thinking.”
Shia LeBeouf was voted “most likely to punch an empty cop car” in high school, so this all checks out. Also, it totally wasn’t a Barnes and Noble window Channing Tatum went Gambit on. It was a store like Barnes and Noble. Probably a Parnes and Boble. They’re big in West Hollywood.
[via GQ]