Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum currently star opposite each other in The Lost City, a new comedy-action film that opens tomorrow in theaters. But the actors became closely acquainted years before the movie entered production for reasons entirely unrelated to show business.
As they explained during a shared appearance on The Late Late Show with James Corden last night, the two first met "in the principal's office" at their children's preschool, where Sandra's daughter, Laila, and Channing's daughter, Everly — now 10 and 8, respectively — were "butting heads" for a while.
"We have two very, very, very strong-willed little girls," said Channing. "That, you know, at that young age were very much butting heads."
While the girls stood at odds, receiving calls from the administration was apparently no rare occurrence for either of their parents, who really, really hoped their kid wasn't to blame for whatever squabble had gone down in class.
"I'm like, 'Please let it be Everly,'" Sandra recalled, while Channing of course remembered wishing the opposite.
"I'd just be like, 'Of all the people...'"
"'Of all the people to fight with...'"
Anyway, the principal apparently phoned to ask Sandra and Channing for guidance as they encouraged Laila and Everly to work things out.
"Do you remember there was a day when they had an altercation," Sandra asked Channing. "And I said, 'Do I need to call Channing or Jenna [Dewan], like, what do I need to do?'"
"And they said, 'No, we're just going to give them a task, a challenge,'" she continued. "And the challenge was: Who can be the nicest to the other one?"
"So, they were like, bringing each other little Dixie cups of water."
"I don't know where they would've learned this competitiveness," Channing joked, looking to Sandra. "At all..."
Anyway, it sounds like the Dixie cup exercise proved effective, at least eventually. You can watch Sandra and Channing recount the whole hilarious anecdote yourself below:
