CHANNING TATUM

Soccer was the first sport that my parents put me in, and ultimately, all the parents kind of came over to my mom and were, 'We think Channing would be better at football.... We love him, he's really great, but he's kind of hurting our children.' I was just a little wild.

I'm thankful for weird people out there 'cause they're some of the most creative people.

No one's calling me for lawyer roles. I still have a lot to do to prove myself.

Daniel Day-Lewis and Sean Penn to me are the two best actors of all time. I'm just glad to have the pleasure to be in an era that they're acting while I'm acting. They're probably the best actors in my mind.

I've never studied the classics, but I'd like to. My teacher offered to show me how the Greeks were able to sculpt someone perfectly. From there, you can go off and experiment - sort of like jazz. Once you learn to play anything, you can break the form and go and do something even bigger.

With dancing, you have to know spatial movement with somebody. It is steps. It's literally steps and knowing how close to be or how far away. You have to have the beat in the right place with the camera.

I still want to write Clint Eastwood a letter saying, 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry for all us wimp actors. You're the truth.' I guarantee he's not the person you want to fight, even now! You look at him, and you don't want to mess with him. He would still take you down.

You have the dreams that you want, and then you have to do other jobs until you can get to that dream.

I have the flying dream a lot where I'm jumping off a building and just flying around.

My mother taught me how to love. My mom is the most loving person I know.

I can't do the same movies all my life. I'm conscious of that. But it's a trade-off. 'Dear John' allowed me to do movies I've wanted to do. You learn to balance it out. I'm still learning. Only now am I getting to do the kinds of movies that I have wanted to do. So it's a steady climb. You don't jump into a Soderbergh film.

I don't think there's a date minimum or maximum. I don't get the whole 'All right, you've got to wait three days to call after the date.' If I got a number from a girl, I'd call that night. There's no science to it for me. You just do what it is that you feel like doing.

I've aways been good at picking up certain things, like sports and dancing.

I grew up in Florida, where if you weren't comfortable dancing, you weren't going to get any girls.

It's embarrassing to tell you how much my friends make fun of me. Seriously, when you have a doll made of your face, it's ridiculous how creative your friends can get... pictures, videos, little animated cartoons that they've made.

But I'm not a tough guy or a street fighter for real. I'm just an actor.

There are so many things I want to do. Like, I want to get an artist, a musician, a photographer, and a bunch of dancers that I know and just travel across Africa and just film it and just see what happens. Do and learn as much as I possibly can. Luckily, I have a lot more time.

I used to work at a puppy nursery.

I'm not a comedian. I can play off of people, but I'm not that guy. I don't want people being like, 'Yeah, he should have stuck with drama.' It would not be my choice to have critics mumbling that.

In the beginning, I would find a character I understood. That was my focus. Not now - but you basically get offered the exact same thing you just did. Which I find hilarious. I did 'The Vow,' and then I had every love story you can imagine thrown at me. And now I'm getting offers for comedies.

I've always negotiated the world very physically, from football to tussling at the playground to taking my clothes off.

'm just going to be a good friend to my kid. One thing I definitely want to change is that whole 'I don't want you to make the same mistakes' mentality. My dad didn't have much money growing up; he didn't have much of an education. He forced that on me, and I didn't want it.

My dad was a roofer when I was young. I believe he owned his own roofing company in Florida. And then he fell through a roof, broke his back. Permanently. I mean, he's not paralyzed or anything, but he's had to deal with pain for all of his life since then.

I can completely lose myself into just absolutely satisfying things - a really amazing cheeseburger, a pizza, good fries, a beer. I enjoy being comfortable and eating whatever the hell I like. It's a big thing for me, just having the freedom to be able to do that.

Well, the first and only time I went hunting, I shot a deer, and it mortified me. I just couldn't do it again. But I know a lot about guns, so I go to the gun range and stuff like that with friends sometimes.