Lizzy Caplan reveals plot of axed Channing Tatum ‘Gambit’ movie
Lizzy Caplan has revealed that Channing Tatum’s cancelled Gambit movie would have thrown the mutant superhero into a “screwball romantic comedy”.
Caplan signed on as the female lead for the proposed X-Men spinoff in November 2017, though precise details about the film were scarce. Tatum had spent years trying to bring a Gambit movie to life, and for a moment, it looked like it would finally happen. However, when Disney purchased Fox in 2019, the project died on the vine.
“It was a really cool idea,” Caplan told Business Insider of the canceled film. “It’s kind of odd that it got scrapped. Those movies don’t seem to ever get scrapped, but it did.”
The Zero Day star continued: “We got down the road, we were gonna shoot it. I think there was a start date. I had meetings with Channing, and there were a couple different…we had a director, then we didn’t, but I had multiple meetings with Channing and the other producers. They wanted to do, like, a ’30s kind of screwball romantic comedy set in that world, which would have been really fun.”
For his part, Tatum told Variety in 2022 that he felt “traumatised” by all his efforts to bring the card-throwing Cajun hero to the screen being for nothing. “I shut off my Marvel machine,” Tatum admitted. “I haven’t been able to see any of the movies. I loved that character. It was just too sad. It was like losing a friend because I was so ready to play him.”
Heartwarmingly, Tatum was finally able to don Gambit’s signature head scarf in 2023’s Deadpool and Wolverine, and fans reacted hugely positively to his hilarious take on the character. It mightn’t have been the solo movie he envisioned, but at least he was able to fulfil his dream in some way.
He revealed on social media: “I thought I had lost Gambit forever. But [Ryan Reynolds] fought for me and Gambit. I will owe him probably forever. Cause I’m not sure how I could ever do something that would be equal to what this has meant to me. I love ya buddy. I’m so grateful to be in this movie. It’s a masterpiece in my opinion. And just pure badass joy. I was literally screaming in the theatre.”
As for whether that glorified cameo will convince Marvel/Disney to finally let Tatum loose on the character in his own adventure, the star confessed, “I’ve been saying I want it for the last 10 years. It’s in Bob Iger and Kevin Feige’s hands. I pray to God.”
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