By Cindy Pearlman | Big Picture News Inc.
LOS ANGELES – On the set of the “Magic Mike” sequel, no one wanted to be XXL in the wrong places. Especially at the expense of a six-pack.
“You should have heard some of the discussions the guys had on the set,” said heartthrob Joe Manganiello of “True Blood” fame.
“It was a bunch of guys going, ‘How many carbs are in that nutrition bar? Well, my nutrition bar has less sugar. Did you try that green smoothie with 21 vegetables instead of ten?’ ” Manganiello said with a laugh.
On a Sunday in Los Angeles, he’s looking lean and mean in a form-fitting white shirt and pressed black pants. The soft-spoken Manganiello takes up an entire doorframe without an ounce of fat on him.
He said that reprising his role as male stripper Richie in “Magic Mike XXL” was actually a dangerous job.
“We rehearsed and rehearsed and rehearsed my finale dance routine, and on the day cameras rolled in front of 1,000 screaming women in the audience, my partner did something unrehearsed,” Manganiello said.
The result “was audible to me,” he said.
“I heard a loud rip in my shoulder followed by an explosive pop,” he recalled. “It was my bicep and I knew that during a normal bicep rip, it rolls into your shoulder and your arm turns black. When that didn’t happen, I knew it was a bone injury.”
His co-star Channing Tatum helped him get through the pain.
“I was lying on a table crying and Channing said, ‘You can do your routine tomorrow. I’ll move mine to today.’ I said, ‘My arm won’t be able to move by tomorrow and this is my last dance. So, there is no tomorrow. I have to do it right now.’ ”
“It was like ‘Rocky,’ ” Manganiello said, laughing. “Channing is standing over me saying, ‘Come on, man! You can do it!’ ”
Incredibly, Manganiello was able to complete a scene where, mostly unclothed, he swings on monkey bars.
“It was like any sports injury. Mind over matter,” he said. “My brain didn’t allow me to visualize landing each time.”
He also had the voice of reason hanging out on the set in the form of his gorgeous fiancee, Sofia Vergara.
“Sofia was there that day. As soon as we wrapped, she said and I quote, ‘If I see you at the f—— gym tomorrow, I’m going to f—— leave you. We’re done.’ ”
Manganiello laughs.
“I haven’t been to the gym since then,” he confessed. “I don’t even think about gyms.”
That’s not necessarily true. He said that cardio plus strength exercises help him stay healthy and ready for anything Hollywood has to offer him. Ask about his workout routine to play a male stripper and he said, “It was thousands of push-ups, thousands of sit-ups, thousands of lat raises.”
“Not that I’m counting,” he says.
He also tries to eat healthy despite Vergara’s penchant for a certain food. “She does love cake. That’s her treat,” he says. “I try to stay away from it, but it’s tough sometimes.”
In “Magic Mike XXL,” he resumes his role as stripper Richie. Three years after Mike (Channing Tatum) quits the male stripper game to start a furniture business, he rejoins the remaining Kings of Tampa on a road trip to Myrtle Beach for one last, blowout performance at a male stripper convention.
Manganiello has one of the film’s best scenes where he enters a mini mart and has to make an extremely peeved clerk smile.
“I’ve done Shakespeare and Ibsen at school. All of that has led to this moment of playing a male stripper,” said Manganiello.
“Scene one. Take one,” he said, framing his hands into a small box like he was directing a scene. “I hear, ‘Joe, you’re going to get naked and cannonball into a small hotel pool with Channing Tatum.’
“That education really paid off,” he said with a laugh.
