It looks like the Will Smith and Chris Rock debacle at the Oscars is impacting more stars than the ones that were involved. According to The Sun, those stars allegedly include Thandiwe Newton, Channing Tatum, and the rest of the cast of the third installment of the Magic Mike franchise, Magic Mike’s Last Dance.
On Wednesday (April 13), Deadline reported that Salma Hayek was stepping in to replace Newton, who had recently exited the film for personal reasons.
“Thandiwe Newton has made the difficult decision to step away from the production of Warner Bros. Pictures’ Magic Mike’s Last Dance to deal with family matters,” a studio spokesperson said in a statement.
Now, it seems like those personal reasons included an argument she allegedly had with Tatum about the infamous slap that Smith delivered to Rock on stage at the Academy Awards ceremony late last month after Rock made a joke about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith.
Also, allegedly Newton’s “difficult decision” was made for her. The Sun is reporting that Tatum, who is a producer on the film, fired her from the movie 11 days into production. Witnesses on the set are said to have seen Newton and Tatum arguing about the incident at the Oscars and that Tatum became “unimaginably vicious” before he got in his car and drove away.
“I was on set. I watched her and watched him,” a source allegedly told The Sun. “They were in and out of the house where we were filming having this confrontation. It was a tense exchange of words…People looked at each other and thought, ‘Wait, we’re supposed to be filming.’”
After the argument was over and Tatum was back on set, the source said that he allegedly said, “I am not working with her anymore.” The source added: “She’s gone. Everything we’ve shot for the last 11 days has to be reshot with a new cast member.”