Johnny Depp Lets Down His Hair

Still, it hasn't escaped Depp that Cruise rakes in a zillion dollars a movie, boasts his own production deal, and can pretty much call his own shots. Depp's quote reportedly weighs in at a couple of million, but his deal at Fox, proffered him around the time of Scissorhands, is kaput. "No disrespect to [former Fox bosses] Joe Roth or Roger Birnbaum, really good guys, but basically, it boiled down to I'd bring them projects and they would go, 'I don't think so,' and they would bring me so-called commercial things and I'd go, 'I'm so not into that.' Most of the things I like and want to be involved in aren't big-budget things. We've all read formula stuff over and over again, so I can't help responding when I read something that really makes me cackle, stays in my memory, makes me feel."

The mere suggestion that he glam up for a big, fat commercial movie again--just for the hell of it--conjures up memories of his cover-boy "21 Jump Street" days as a national adolescent pastime. "The image of me that was being catapulted into people's guts made me sick. I'm sure it must have made a lot of people sick. Once I realized I had no control over what they were doing, which was, like, selling this product, I also realized, 'These people will drain your blood and fucking leave you by the side of the road.' I knew that I had to fight real hard and had to go completely against the grain, against their expectations. The amazing thing is that, since then, I've so far been able to do what I've really wanted to do. I don't know how long anyone gets to do that. I just hope that people will keep giving me jobs."

Which is another way of saying that he's hip to the perils of making too many outlaw movies, a strategy that nowadays can often pave the road to outlaw cable-TV movies. "It's dangerous," he admits, drumming the table's edge. "It can be a little frightening at times. I don't want to sound like some pompous actor asshole telling you he only wants to do 'important' stuff. I mean, some of the things I've been offered were not so bad. Not bad at all, even. They were just things I didn't really feel like I wanted to do. Or couldn't see myself doing. That could be a very big mistake at times because, it's just like anything: you have to keep a balance. I'm not going to be able to do the things I want to do if I don't do a certain amount of--whatever you want to call that stuff--to stay up in the eyes of the studio people."

That might help explain the hot and heavy rumors that Depp will soon do a quintessential studio package, a Three Musketeers movie for Jeremiah Chechik, his Benny & Joon director, playing D'Artagnan, perhaps to Winona Ryder's wicked Milady de Winter, swashing and buckling with a bunch of other doll-face swordsmen. "At first, I liked the idea," Depp admits, sounding almost sheepish, "because I'd like to do that book, that period and because Jeremiah's got a real good notion about making it brilliant and rich with guys in long hair, goatees, sword-fighting and leaping over each other." Fine, so what's the "but" I detect in his voice? He laughs, "But ... it started to smell like Young Guns in Tights, vou know? Like Guess? Jeans boys flashing swords. If that's what somebody else wants to do, great. For me, though, no--I got real nervous. Right now," he says, gesturing his hand in a fifty-fifty sign, "it's exactly in the middle for me. I couldn't make a movie until I know exactly who else is going to be in it. How's it going to be done? What's it boil down to?"

Whether or not he decides to step into those Musketeers tights, it's clear that Depp prefers more unconventional stuff. Ask how he and director Lasse Hallstrom are getting along while making Gilbert Grape and the response is pure, unadulterated Depp. "My character's uneasy with people so, like, if something gets too serious on the set, like if I'm feeling, 'God, I'm doing a scene,' Lasse automatically starts talking about radishes to get me back into how uncomfortable my character is. Lasse says stuff like, 'If a radish were up your butt, how far would it be? All the way in? Halfway? Just entering?' A radish is a pretty solid image, you know? So, that's how he communicates. He's allergic to bullshit."

If the Gilbert Grape chat suggests they're not making a movie for Hollywood suits, it also remains to be seen what the suits will make of Depp in Arizona Dream. All Depp's certain of is that he's "thrilled to have made it with Emir Kusturica," whom he met three years ago when the Yugoslavian director was riding a wave of international acclaim for Time of the Gypsies. Observes Depp, "Emir was wide-eyed and sort of shocked by everything he was seeing in L.A. At the time, I was really miserable doing the TV series. It was a great combination."

The director surrounded Depp, reportedly the only actor he wanted for the role, with hellacious co-stars: the legendary Faye Dunaway, Jerry Lewis, supermodel Paulina Porizkova, and, to round things out, Lili Taylor. Rumors flew: Language barriers, on-set tantrums, hand-wringing producers. Then, the movie, already months into production, shut down.

Putting the best face on what some might recall as a nightmarish career-staller, Depp says, "Emir got sick because he had never made a film in the States and had no idea, really, about the merging of commerce and art. He doesn't think about money. Giving someone like Emir all kinds of rules about budget, schedules, timing, things that are really stifling, was a shock to the system. Look, I can't even say that he's a great filmmaker; he's just an amazing guy with nothing but talent and this gift for just inventing scenes."

Depp is more forthcoming about working with Faye Dunaway, who he calls "the last of her kind, a real old-time movie star," someone who's "all extremes, like a fire that never stops moving." So what's it like being around a woman aflame? "She'll take no shit and compromise nothing, which I really admire," he asserts. "Hers is a very specific way of working, which isn't necessarily a way for me. Sometimes, when we were working, it could get, uhhmm, interesting, but the result is staggering. I'd be doing a scene with her, watching her the whole time, and only later, watching it on-screen, could I see what she was actually doing. I enjoyed everything I could get from her: sweetness, anger, sadness. We have some good, good fire together. Sometimes, I couldn't get over the fact that, you know--'I'm making love with Bonnie Parker.'"

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