No./2 Magic Mike’s curtain call
STEVEN SODERBERGH on directing his stripper swan song
Dirty dancing — Channing Tatum and Salma Hayek;
IF STEVEN SODERBERGH hadn’t been replaced as the director of Moneyball, Magic Mike may never have come to be. Instead of helming the Brad Pitt-fronted sports movie (eventually directed by Bennett Miller), the filmmaker moved onto Haywire and, while speaking to star Channing Tatum, saw instant opportunity in a throwaway comment. “It’s crazy,” Soderbergh tells Empire. “Just one sentence. He said to me, ‘Oh yeah, I’m working on this idea of when I was a stripper in Tampa when I was 19.’”