Channing Tatum eyeing remake of 'Ghost' as he gives up the ghost on his 'Gambit' movie

When one door closes, another will open — even for specters unbothered by such trifling barriers. Though Channing Tatum sounds like he’s resigned to cut the cord for good on his ill-fated X-Men spinoff film, he’s already got his supernatural sights set on something else: a big-screen remake of a Patrick Swayze classic.

Tatum recently revealed to Vanity Fair that his production company has acquired the rights to Ghost, Paramount’s 1990 classic starring Demi Moore and the late, great Swayze about a love unfazed by mere mortality. Chatting with an interviewer while throwing pottery (just like Swayze and Moore in the film’s most famous scene), the actor shared that his Free Association banner has plans for a Ghost movie remake that puts Tatum himself in Swayze’s starring role as Sam Wheat, the murdered boyfriend of Molly Jensen (Moore) who returns as a spirit to help her catch the killer.

“But,” Tatum elaborated, “we’re going to do something different. I think it needs to change a little bit…” he continued before leaving the intriguing thought unfinished — thanks to his pottery project spinning out of control.

That’s all the info Tatum shared in outlining his paranormal remake plans. But he sounds like he’s folding on another of his big-screen ideas, cashing out on the prospect that Gambit — the telekinetic card-slinging X-Men character he hoped to someday portray — will ever score with a blockbuster movie of his own.

From the concept’s earliest days, Tatum has been front and center for all the fan excitement over Gambit’s potential entry into the Marvel movie-mutant franchise. But for various development-hell reasons, the project never really got off the ground, and in his remarks to Vanity Fair, Tatum sounded like a guy resigned to treating a Gambit standalone feature as an idea whose time has sadly passed.

“It got swallowed up into Disney by way of Marvel when they bought Fox, and ultimately I just think that the tone of the movie we wanted to make was very far from what they wanted to do — or, you know, maybe they’re waiting to see how they do it with us or without us,” Tatum explained. “We call every once in a while, but we’ve got to spiritually, emotionally, kind of mentally let it go.”

That’s not exactly the payout fans were hoping for ever since news first came in 2014 that Tatum would headline a movie based on the Chris Claremont and Jim Lee-created character. To date, Gambit’s lone portrayal on the big screen remains confined to 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, where the staff-wielding, energy-channeling character was portrayed by Taylor Kitsch.

Even with his Gambit movie plans all but cashed out, Tatum’s got tons of screen projects still to shuffle. In addition to the more distant Ghost remake, he’s set to put the moves on fans when Magic Mike’s Last dance arrives in theaters on Feb. 10. He’s also attached to the upcoming Greg Berlanti-directed sci-fi movie Project Artemis at Apple TV+, while starring opposite Adam Sandler, Paul Dano, Carey Mulligan and more in Spaceman, the sci-fi feature film set to premiere at Netflix sometime this summer.

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