Magic Mike XXL Is About Friendship, Sexuality And A Journey

Greg Jacobs has had a close working relationship with acclaimed filmmaker Steven Soderbergh for over 20 years, working for instance as producer on Magic Mike. “[Soderbergh] said that he didn’t want to direct the sequel when we started talking about it and I very much did and Channing was very supportive of that,” Jacobs explains. “Stephen wanted to stay involved but he let [producer and writer Reid Carolin] and I sort of go off and develop this and figure out what it was going to be.”

“It’s great because they know these characters so well – we have this great script and these guys bring individual qualities to each of the roles.”  

Film sequels are often taken over by filmmakers new to the project, however, since Jacobs had been involved in the project since the very beginning, he knew exactly what kind of film he wanted to make. “I knew very clearly that I didn’t want to make the same movie as the first, I didn’t want to watch the same movie — I’d want it to be different. We knew what sort of themes we wanted to explore and I also wanted there to be a tonal shift and knew that by taking this different journey and making a road trip picture which was based on a real experience that Chan had [the actor actually was a male dancer before heading to Hollywood] that that would enable us to shift tone and introduce new characters and that was something very interesting to me.”

The sequel, set three years on from the first film, revolves around the title character, played by Tatum, who, after leaving the stripper world behind, decides to do one last show with his group, which includes recurring characters played by Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer and wrestler Kevin Nash: “It’s great because they know these characters so well – we have this great script and these guys bring individual qualities to each of the roles.”  

Many initially questioned Jacobs’ desire to be involved in the comedy-drama, since his previous projects have been much more serious in tone, producing, among others, Contagion, Edge Of Tomorrow, Side Effects and current TV series, The Knick, and while admitting the nature of the film may seem left-field, it was the story that drew Jacobs in. “When Channing talked to me about the first movie, immediately I thought it was a great idea. Even though on the surface it may feel like an overtly comedic movie or something that’s not fertile ground for an interesting story, as soon as we started talking to Reid and Chan about it, it provided exactly what I immediately thought it could be.

“So I knew when it came time to do a second movie that, yeah, it’s a movie about strippers on a road trip, but there could also be interesting undercurrents that we could bring to it – a journey that these guys are on, trying to figure out what their life is going to be, discussions between men and women about sexuality and a movie about friendship.”