Emma Watson’s Distaste for Channing Tatum’s On-set Speedo Dance Doesn’t Make Her a Prude

This incident will be a blast from the past, taking us back to 2013. Specifically, back to the set of Seth Rogan’s film, This is the End.

Despite the fact that this took place in 2013, it’s interesting to note that even in 2020, this brief encounter is still being held against Emma Watson today.

I had never heard of the “On-set Speedo Incident” before, but recently I was scrolling through social media and encountered a story about why Emma Watson and Channing Tatum don’t work together professionally anymore.

I was shocked to hear about what happened, and also enraged to see that the narrative still remains that Channing Tatum was just having fun, and Emma Watson is a prude who needs to learn to take a joke.

Even 7 years later, this is still being held against her. It is beyond ridiculous.

What actually took place?

Notably, this incident is accounted for by several eye-witnesses (including James Franco, a known misogynist, who references the incident in an interview and calls Emma Watson ‘too sensitive’) rather than the stars themselves, although when asked they haven’t denied it happened.

In essence, during the filming of This is the End, while on set Channing Tatum came out of his dressing room sporting only a tight, orange spandex speedo/thong and did a little dance number (reminiscent of his strip teases in ‘Magic Mike’). Emma Watson walked on set, saw this taking place, and walked off the set moments later.

Since then, Emma Watson (who said nothing at the time, just removed herself from the situation), has been labelled a prude who needs to “relax” and “learned how to take a joke” because Tatum was “just having fun”.

There’s double standard playing out here, even 7 years later, that needs to be talked about.

And we’re going to dig into it right now:

The gender imbalance of Hollywood.

On its own, this little dance is innocent enough — but it crosses a line as soon as this dance was performed on-set (note: it wasn’t scripted in any way for the movie) during filming, aka. at their place of work.

We can’t start talking about this incident without highlighting that white men make up the majority of Hollywood. They have easier access to a diversity of roles, they are given permission to make mistakes and act foolishly without repercussions, and are given a lot of flexibility in their Hollywood careers.

Women in Hollywood, on the other hand, are still struggling for equal pay and more diverse roles that highlight their true acting ability rather than using them as sex objects to ogle at.

The Glass Ceiling very much still exists in Hollywood, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media conducted research that for every 2.3 men on-screen in a film, there is 1 woman. This includes main role, supporting and background roles.

Women in Hollywood are still scrapping tooth and nail to claim their rightful and equal place in Hollywood, and secure the complex and varied roles that properly represent the gender distribution of our world (women make up 51% of the global population, but less than 25% of representation on screen).

Already, women are at a disadvantage with how much permission they are given to let their guard down professionally. Men have no such worry.

Striving to be respected as a professional.

Keep in mind that Watson and Tatum were on-set when this incident happened — which means they were at their place of work.

Just imagine a male employee dancing in a thong/speedo at an office, or a grocery store, or a law firm.

Yes, it’s as ridiculous as it sounds and wouldn’t be appropriate— which is precisely why Emma Watson was so put off by her co-star’s behaviour.

Like any professional workplace, there should be an expectation for staff and crew to behave respectfully and professionally.

That is exactly what Watson was attempting to do — Tatum, on the other hand, had to put so little effort into securing roles and respect from others that he could make a total joke of their workplace and his professional role without it making any difference.

If anything, it just made people on-set laugh.

Though, worth noting that the majority of people on set at that time would have also statistically been men.

Here’s Emma Watson behaving professionally and respectfully, watching a privileged white dude do a sexually explicit, skimpily clad dance just for the fun of it directly in their place of work and it’s just considered whatever.

I would have stormed off of set as well. The double standard here is beyond nauseating.

Privilege plays a big role here.

If Watson were to dance around on set, aka. her workplace, in a skimpy orange bikini, that would hurt her reputation and brand as a professional actress.

However, Tatum dancing around in an orange speedo in no way risks his reputation, or the respect he receives, from his colleagues.

He didn’t even have to worry about such a thing, because he’s never had to consider it.

He’s just used to having his childish antics and acting abilities separated from one another at the end of the day.

Whereas women are scrutinized by the media for everything they do, every step of the way — from the clothes they wear, to the company they keep, to the looks caught on their faces when a picture was taken in the heat of a moment.

There’s a reason it’s called “Resting B*tch Face” and not “Resting Bastard Face”.

No wonder Watson walked off of the set when she saw Tatum’s antics— she could see the blatant and ridiculous gender imbalance of Hollywood playing out right in front of her, and it was beyond insulting.

Women must work incredibly hard to be respected and recognized as professional actresses, without being immediately sexualized by directors.

Men, however, are allotted this respect straight off the bat, no questions asked.

That fact is infuriating.

And even 7 years later, it’s still playing an active role in our society, as the media still likes to reference this incident and label Watson as a “prude”, without ever highlighting Tatum’s complete and utter lack of professionalism.

Final word.

For anyone living in privilege, who has been allotted automatic respect or opportunities in life, they may not necessarily see this situation as a big deal.

But for anyone who has ever had to work 2x, 3x as hard or even more to even get anywhere near close the respect and opportunities of more privileged folk… they can appreciate exactly why this moment was such a slap in the face for Watson as a professional woman.

I can already hear the comments online erupting with,

“Not everything is about privilege!”

“Why do we always have to talk about how white men have it easier? They have their struggles too.”

“Simply focusing on skin colour in any way in this article is racist!”

And I’m sure it will be no surprise to most of you that these comments will come mostly from equally privileged white men.

My word to those commenters? If you really, truly think an incident like the one discussed above has nothing to do with privilege, it’s time to take off your blinders.

This is your wake up call. You may not want to see it, but your privilege exists and it gives you many advantages you never earned… you were simply given them because of pure luck.

If you think my pointing that mere fact out is unfair, imagine being someone actually living on the side of things that doesn’t get to benefit from these advantages that were not earned, but were just given.

It’s an infuriating reality.

This article was originally published by the author on Medium.