The world premiere of Josephine at Park City’s Eccles Theater turned into a full-on emotional workout, and not just for the audience. Channing Tatum sat there crying “five, six, seven times” while watching the film for the first time. Yes, really. This wasn’t a polite dab-the-eyes situation. This was full surrender.
Josephine follows an 8-year-old girl who witnesses a brutal sexual assault in a San Francisco park and then tries to make sense of the fear that settles into her life afterward. Tatum and Gemma Chan play her parents, stuck in that awful space where you want to protect your child but don’t have the right words yet. You could feel it in the room. People cried. They laughed during the few lighter beats. They cheered when they needed relief.
Writer-director Beth de Araújo knows this story too well. She started writing the film in 2014 after realizing something from her own childhood still haunted her. “I took a stab at writing about female fear, and how that’s shaped who I’ve become,” she said during the Q&A, explaining why she kept the story through an 8-year-old’s eyes. When she stepped on stage Friday afternoon, the standing ovation hit hard. She cried. So did plenty of others.
Then there’s Mason Reeves. Eight years old. First movie. Discovered at a farmer’s market in San Francisco. Casual. When asked what she liked most about acting, she said, “what I liked most was all of it.” The crowd laughed. Reeves later admitted she’d prefer something lighter next time, listing action, fantasy, a musical, animals, or “one a movie filmed in Paris.” Same, honestly.
Tatum, a father to a 12-year-old daughter, worried about playing a parent who snaps at Josephine. “I was concerned about her actually thinking I was mad at her,” he said. “I was like, ‘You know I’m just acting, right?’” Reeves shut that down fast: “I’m fine!”
Chan, the first actor to sign on, said “there was a truth radiating from the page.” You can feel that truth as a viewer too. It sticks with you.
That emotional honesty connects to another recent moment for Tatum. In December, at the Dance Hall of Fame Ceremony in Los Angeles, the 45-year-old honored his late Magic Mike XXL co-star Stephen “tWitch” Boss, who died in 2022 at age 40. “I promised myself I wasn’t going to cry,” Tatum said, before doing exactly that. He spoke about Boss’ joy, his talent, and how he “loved fiercely.” The room felt it. You probably would have too.
Watching Tatum break down, whether at Sundance for Josephine or on a stage in Los Angeles, lands differently now. It reminds you that sitting with hard stories matters, even when it hurts. Especially then.
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