It’s Official, Chere: Channing Tatum To Star In ‘Gambit’ Movie

Step aside, Taylor Kitsch. Magic Mike has usurped your place as 20th Century Fox's movie version of X-Man Gambit, mon chere.

Producer Laura Shuler Donner made the news official Tuesday at the London premiere of X-Men: Days of Future Past with the announcement of a new Gambit spinoff in which actor Channing Tatum will star. It's likely to hit theaters in the summer of 2018.

Here's what Donner had to say about Tatum's fit for the role:

He’s a rogue, Channing, he’s a rascal just like Remy Lebeau. And he can handle the action, we all know that. And he’s got a really good heart, ‘cause I know him personally, I did a movie with him. So I think he’ll be great, he’ll be great for Gambit. And he’s a Southerner, too. He’s not from New Orleans, but he is a Southerner, he understands that world, and you know Gambit loves New Orleans.

Last month, Tatum said he had been "in talks" with the producers of the X-Men franchise about starring in a Gambit movie, and years before that he auditioned to play the character in X-Men: The Last Stand. Clearly, he's into playing, as Donner said, the "rogue" who constantly flirts with Rogue.

This won't be the first time a major X-Men character has been recast. Actor Liev Schreiber took over the role of Sabretooth from Tyler Mane in 2009's X-Men Origins: Wolverine. That was the movie in which poor Kitsch, who has had a string of bad luck with genre movies including the cool-but-financially-underperforming John Carter, played Gambit.

Tatum has not reportedly signed on to star in the next X-movie, X-Men: Apocalypse, which comes out in 2016, but that doesn't rule out a post-credits appearance or a cameo.

[Via ScreenCrush]