Nearly five years after Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan were declared legally single, they still have details to iron out regarding their divorce settlement — and it’s all about Magic Mike money.
Dewan, 43, submitted court documents on Wednesday, April 10, of her preliminary witness list to “testify regarding all issues related to the parties’ marriage including business and financial activities.” Tatum, 43, submitted his own list that day and requested that both Dewan and her fiancé, Steve Kazee, give court testimony about joint expenses and living arrangements. Magic Mike director Steven Soderbergh is also on the witness list, according to legal filings obtained by Us Weekly.
For Dewan specifically, she is requesting half of Tatum’s intellectual property earnings from Magic Mike and claimed that she and Tatum had previously agreed to give her an equal share. The film, inspired by Tatum’s past as a dancer, premiered in 2012 and has since spawned two sequels and a live stage show in Las Vegas and London.
Dewan claimed that she is entitled to compensation from his salary since the movie “was developed and co-financed by Channing with community effort and marital funds,” further alleging that they acquired the project together.
While Dewan and Tatum disagree over the IP of Magic Mike, it is not the only way they make money. Dewan, for her part, primarily gets income from her salary; she is an actress, who is currently starring ABC’s The Rookie. Additional income is accrued from other royalties (from past acting jobs airing in syndication, such as Supergirl, Step Up and others likely), brand partnerships (she has partnered with Wells Fargo, Lindt and Neostrata on Instagram in the last year) and various investments. She also cofounded production company 33andOut Productions with Tatum and several business partners.
She also owns her own home, paid via mortgage, where she lives with Everly. (Kazee, 48, also lives with Dewan, as does their son, Callum.) Dewan also covers Everly’s medical expenses and health insurance costs.
Tatum, for his part, also makes a living as an actor (he’ll star in Fly Me to the Moon opposite Scarlett Johansson as well as fiancée Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut Blink Twice this year). He also co-own production company 33andOut Productions with Dewan, as well as another production company, Iron Horse Entertainment. In addition to royalties from his acting gigs and Magic Mike properties, he had made numerous investments through the years in companies such as Manscaped, Runa energy drink and more. An October 2023 Forbes report put his estimated net worth at $80 million.
Magic Mike is another lucrative venture. Magic Mike grossed $167 million at the global box office, with Magic Mike XXL earning $122 million and Magic Mike’s Last Dance pulling in $57 million. The stage residencies have proven profitable, even spawning the Max reality show Finding Magic Mike. According to a February 2023 report by Bloomberg, the stage show — with separate productions in Las Vegas and London — sold more than $125 million worth of tickets.
A hearing in Dewan and Tatum’s case took place on Friday, April 12, where Dewan’s lawyer claimed that Tatum and his business managers are hiding the assets as they placed the Magic Mike earnings in “a complex web of LLCs, holding companies, and partnerships, all of which are calculated to dilute and conceal the value of, and licensing income to, the community property Magic Mike intellectual property and derivative assets.” She also claims he “engaged in a variety of self-dealing transactions designed to disguise Magic Mike intellectual property and derivative asset income as performance and consulting fees.”
“The Magic Mike intellectual property and all the proceeds thereon is the elephant in the room,” Dewan’s lawyer, Samantha Spector, told the judge. “We have, for the last couple of years, been trying to meaningfully resolve this case, but every time we do, we get stuck on that issue with Magic Mike. We are dealing with a potential billion-dollar asset.”
Dewan wants a separate trial over the Magic Mike assets for the court to determine what fiduciary duty Tatum has, if he is in breach of said duties and what damages Dewan is entitled to.
Tatum’s attorneys denied on Friday that the actor hid proceeds via protected trust, asserting that he’s “never denied” Dewan a share of their community assets or income.
“All transactions were made at arm’s length; Petitioner was represented by counsel, signed gift tax returns, and actively participated in transactions for the benefit of the community and the parties’ daughter,” his lawyers wrote in an affidavit, per the Daily Mail. “The evidence will show Respondent [Tatum] has never taken actions to detriment the community or Petitioner [Dewan].”
Tatum’s team also claimed that Magic Mike was the most profitable after he and Dewan separated in 2018. Us Weekly confirmed in November 2019 that a judge granted the pair’s request to be deemed legally single, at which point they agreed to share joint physical and legal custody of daughter Everly.
Per Dewan’s team, once they settle the Magic Mike dispute, she is willing to work on an agreement regarding other assets and custody. She noted that the trial’s outcome will affect the income available to provide for child support and reimbursement claims.
