Public Enemies
Johnny Depp will play the charismatic bank robber John Dillinger—the original Public Enemy #1—in Michael Mann’s film PUBLIC ENEMIES, which is scheduled to begin shooting in March 2008 on location in Illinois and Wisconsin. The project came into play when the Writers Guild of America strike forced a postponement of Mira Nair’s SHANTARAM, thereby leaving Johnny with some free time in his schedule. Johnny met with Michael Mann a few hours before the Los Angeles premiere of SWEENEY TODD in early December, and, according to Variety, “the director and actor shook hands on a deal that triggers a March 10 start for PUBLIC ENEMIES in Chicago.” Playing Dillinger’s girlfriend Billie Frechette will be current Golden Globe winner and Oscar nominee Marion Cotillard, while Christian Bale will appear as Dillinger’s nemesis, FBI agent Melvin Purvis. Other cast members include Channing Tatum as gangster Pretty Boy Floyd, Giovanni Ribisi as Alvin Karpis, Stephen Dorff and Jason Clarke as Dillinger gang members Homer Van Meter and John “Red” Hamilton, and John Ortiz as Al Capone’s associate Frank Nitti.
PUBLIC ENEMIES will be Johnny Depp’s first work for Michael Mann, who has directed COLLATERAL, ALI, HEAT, THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS, and THE INSIDER (for which he received an Oscar nomination); he also produced and created the long-running television series MIAMI VICE and directed the recent remake. PUBLIC ENEMIES will be made for Universal, with Mann and his production company Forward Pass producing along with Kevin Misher and his Misher Films. Tribeca's Jane Rosenthal will be executive producer. Dante Spinotti, a frequent Mann collaborator, will be director of photography; costume design will be by Oscar-winner Colleen Atwood, whose most recent film was SWEENEY TODD.
The shooting script for PUBLIC ENEMIES was written by Ronan Bennett and Ann Biderman, and revised by Michael Mann. It is based on Bryan Burrough's 2004 book, PUBLIC ENEMIES: AMERICA'S GREATEST CRIME WAVE AND THE BIRTH OF THE FBI, 1933-34, which focuses on several high-profile bank robbers all operating in the Midwest at the same time, including John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, and Pretty Boy Floyd. Notes Variety, "In 1933, police jurisdictions ended at state lines, the FBI was in its infancy, the highway system was spreading, fast cars and machine guns were easily available, and a good number of the thirteen million Americans who were out of work blamed the Great Depression on the banks. In short, it was a wonderful time to be a bank robber. On hand to take full advantage was a motley assortment of criminal masterminds, sociopaths, romantics, and cretins, some of whom, with a little help from J. Edgar Hoover, were to become some of the most famous criminals in American history." Of these high profile criminals, none captured the public imagination like John Dillinger. --Part-Time Poet
Shantaram
In October 2004, Warner Bros. and Graham King’s Initial Entertainment Group spent $2 million to acquire the rights to Gregory David Roberts’ semi-autobiographical novel SHANTARAM--"primarily because of Johnny Depp," Variety reported, "who told Grey [Brad Grey, then a Warner Bros. executive, now heading Paramount] about his love for the book." Johnny will play Lindsay, an Australian heroin addict who escapes from prison and flees to India, where he reinvents himself as a doctor in the slums of Bombay. As Lindsay tries to help his destitute patients, he turns to counterfeiting, smuggling, and gunrunning; he also falls in love with Karla, a Swiss-American beauty with secrets of her own. "This huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart," notes Amazon.com. "Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature." The photo, taken by longtime Depp friend Bill Carter, shows Johnny with author Gregory Roberts in London in November 2004.
Pre-production work began with novelist Roberts writing the first draft of the screenplay, which he submitted in summer 2005, and Warner Bros., Initial Entertainment Group, and Johnny’s Infinitum Nihil as producers. In late October 2005, Warner Bros. hired FORREST GUMP screenwriter Eric Roth to rewrite Roberts’ script, and on December 1st announced that four-time Oscar-nominee Peter Weir would direct SHANTARAM, with production scheduled to begin in November 2006. However, on June 12, 2006, Hollywood trade papers reported Peter Weir’s departure from SHANTARAM. "Peter moved on from this film because his interpretation of it differed greatly [. . . from] that of the studio and producers," said a Warner Bros. spokesman; no meeting of the minds could be reached.
On January 18, 2007, Variety reported that acclaimed director Mira Nair had won the plum assignment of directing SHANTARAM. A native of India, where much of SHANTARAM is set, Ms. Nair is ideally suited to bring Gregory David Roberts' complex adventure tale to the screen. "We are really enthusiastic about having Mira onboard this incredible project," producer Graham King told the press. "With her lush visual style, she lends an authentic and vital eye to this story which has been beautifully adapted for the big screen by Eric Roth, a master storyteller. We are also thrilled to be pairing up Mira with the uniquely talented Johnny Depp."
Mira Nair's previous films include SALAAM BOMBAY!, her first feature, which was nominated for an Academy Award, Golden Globe, and BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1988; MISSISSIPPI MASALA, an interracial love story starring Denzel Washington and Sarita Choudhury, which won 3 awards at the Venice Film Festival; MONSOON WEDDING, which won the Golden Lion at the 2001 Venice Film Festival and received Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations as Best Foreign Film; the HBO film HYSTERICAL BLINDNESS, which won a Golden Globe for Uma Thurman and three Emmy Awards; and VANITY FAIR, starring Reese Witherspoon. Her most recent film, Fox Searchlight's THE NAMESAKE, was released to uniformly excellent reviews on March 9, 2007.
Mira Nair told Reuters that she was "elated and honored" to have the opportunity to direct Johnny Depp. "Johnny Depp is an extraordinary human being, an extraordinary actor, and he embodies so much of what SHANTARAM is," Nair explained. "So when he asked me to direct him, it was just a great honor. It's also a great honor to get India right on screen." Casting is presently underway; Indian star Amitabh Bachchan will play Kaderbhai, the Mumbai gangster who becomes a mentor and surrogate father to Johnny's character of Lin. Predicted Nair, "Amitabh Bachchan and Johnny Depp will be very good together."
Principal photography on SHANTARAM had been scheduled to begin in January 2008, but unfortunately the strike by the Writers Guild caused Warner Bros. to delay filming, as the script was not yet ready to shoot. Johnny Depp moved on to PUBLIC ENEMIES, while Mira Nair agreed to direct Hilary Swank as Amelia Earhart in AMELIA, which begins shooting in April 2008. --Part-Time Poet
The Rum Diary
Johnny Depp’s Infinitum Nihil will join with Graham King’s GK Films and Warner Independent Pictures to film Hunter S. Thompson’s 1959 novel THE RUM DIARY; current plans, according to articles in Variety (July 29) and The Hollywood Reporter (July 30), are to shoot THE RUM DIARY immediately after Johnny finishes Mira Nair’s SHANTARAM in May 2008. Also producing will be Film Engine, which has been with the long-gestating project since 2002. Johnny Depp will play Paul Kemp, a New York writer who comes to Puerto Rico in the 1950s; Kemp longs to be Hemingway but instead becomes a freelancer at the San Juan Daily News to pay his bills. “All manner of men came to work for the News,” Thompson writes, “everything from wild young Turks who wanted to rip the world in half and start all over again—-to tired, beer-bellied old hacks who wanted nothing more than to live out their days in peace before a bunch of lunatics ripped the world in half.” Kemp does what most Hemingway wannabes do—-writes to make a living, compromises his standards, hangs out with a colorful, hard-living crowd, soaks up the local culture and a considerable quantity of the local alcohol, gets in a spot of trouble with the law, and falls for the wrong woman . . . in Kemp’s case, a co-worker’s stunning girlfriend. While Thompson’s novel (written in 1959 but not published until 1998, nearly 40 years later) draws on his real-life experience as a journalist in Puerto Rico during that period, THE RUM DIARY is fiction—a work of the imagination, not an autobiography.
Bruce Robinson, who wrote and directed the cult comedy classic WITHNAIL AND I (one of Johnny Depp’s favorite films), will adapt THE RUM DIARY for the screen and direct. Robinson’s adaptation of THE KILLING FIELDS (1984) earned him an Oscar nomination and won the BAFTA and Writer’s Guild of America Award. This project is not the first time Johnny Depp has approached Bruce Robinson to direct him; during Robinson’s commentary track on the DVD of WITHNAIL AND I (1987), the director reports that he was asked by Johnny to write and direct the film of Hunter S. Thompson’s classic FEAR AND LOATHIHG IN LAS VEGAS. According to Robinson, he said No to that offer because he couldn’t imagine “how you could get that one on the screen.” FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS (1988) got made with Terry Gilliam in the director’s chair; now Robinson will have his turn to bring a Thompson-Depp collaboration to the screen with THE RUM DIARY. No other casting or production staff choices have been announced.
THE RUM DIARY’s journey to the screen has already been quite a long road (although a mere fraction of the time it took Thompson’s novel to find publication); the work was first optioned in 2000 by the independent production company Shooting Gallery (great name—-sadly, the firm no longer exists, although producer Robert Kravis is still attached to the project) and SPi Films. Johnny Depp would be executive producer and star as Paul Kemp, with Nick Nolte also starring and producing through his firm, Kingsgate Entertainment (no relationship to Graham King).
Two years later, Film Engine picked up the option and announced plans to produce THE RUM DIARY with Kingsgate partner Greg Shapiro (who is still attached to the film). Benicio Del Toro (who starred in FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS) and Josh Hartnett joined the cast, with Del Toro slated to make his directorial debut. The film was scheduled to shoot in late 2003, right after Johnny finished SECRET WINDOW for David Koepp . . . but then fate intervened. Del Toro had a family emergency and withdrew as director; Hartnett had THE BLACK DAHLIA and other films waiting for his services; and Johnny Depp, due to the worldwide success of a little pirate film he made for Disney, was the hottest actor on the planet. The window of opportunity to shoot THE RUM DIARY passed by. Instead, Johnny filmed THE LIBERTINE (another long-simmering independent project) in early 2004 and then a slew of major films: CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY, DEAD MAN’S CHEST, AT WORLD’S END, and the recently completed SWEENEY TODD. Hunter Thompson’s tragic death in February 2005 would also require a period of mourning and adjustment for those connected to THE RUM DIARY; it must have been heartbreaking to consider making the film as a posthumous tribute to the Good Doctor rather than a shared enterprise.
THE RUM DIARY found new life in April 2007 when Dark & Stormy Entertainment, a new company co-founded by Robert Kravis, joined the project as producers. Now with Graham King’s GK Films and Warner Independent Pictures signing on the dotted line to produce with Johnny’s Infinitum Nihil (which didn’t exist when THE RUM DIARY was first optioned, or when the 2003 deal fell apart), THE RUM DIARY has never had a better chance to make it to film. Of the previous cast members, only Johnny Depp remains with the project; Del Toro, Hartnett, and Nolte are no longer attached.
A spokesman for Graham King’s GK Films told The Hollywood Reporter on July 30th that they hope that production on THE RUM DIARY will begin “shortly after principal photography is completed on Johnny Depp’s next film, Mira Nair’s crime drama SHANTARAM.” Unfortunately, both SHANTARAM and THE RUM DIARY were postponed in November 2007 due to the Hollywood writers’ strike; no new shooting dates have been announced. --Part-Time Poet
Dark Shadows
Will Johnny Depp play Barnabas Collins, the angst-ridden vampire of Collinsport? That’s a strong possibility, now that Johnny Depp’s Infinitum Nihil and Graham King’s GK Films have signed a deal with Warner Bros. to develop a feature film based on the groundbreaking late 1960s gothic daytime drama DARK SHADOWS. "Johnny Depp is getting in touch with his inner vampire," reports Michael Fleming of Variety in a story dated July 26, 2007. "A rights deal just closed with the estate of Dan Curtis, the producer/director who created the soap that aired weekdays on ABC, from 1966 to 1971. Depp and King will produce with David Kennedy, who ran Dan Curtis Productions until Curtis died last year of a brain tumor. Infinitum Nihil's Christi Dembrowski [IN’s president and Johnny’s sister] served as the point person on the deal."
For those Deppheads who never saw DARK SHADOWS, it was a highly innovative and popular afternoon serial which ran for 1,225 episodes on the ABC network from 1966 to 1971. Steeped in suspense, DARK SHADOWS employed gothic conventions and featured leading characters who were vampires, werewolves, and witches. So strong was the show's mythology that it continued to engross fans long after DARK SHADOWS left ABC; it spawned several films and then TV revivals, as well as annual fan conventions, called Dark Shadows Festivals, which began in 1983 and continue to thrive. The Sci-Fi channel re-aired the original series in the 1990s and early 2000s, introducing the inhabitants of Collinsport to a new generation of fans.
Johnny Depp has told many interviewers of his affection for DARK SHADOWS, especially the character of the vampire Barnabas Collins, played by Jonathan Frid. Reports Variety, "Depp has said in interviews that he has always been obsessed with DARK SHADOWS and has wanted to play Collins, the vampire patriarch of the series." Coincidentally, series creator Dan Curtis gave his blessing to Johnny playing his most famous character in an interview published online on five years ago (September 18, 2002). Responding to a suggestion that a DARK SHADOWS film remake would work if Johnny Depp were cast as Barnabas, Curtis replied: "I agree that Johnny Depp would be great as a new Barnabas."
At this point, no director or writer has been selected for DARK SHADOWS. --Part-Time Poet
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Johnny Depp won his first Golden Globe Award as Best Actor for playing Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of Fleet Street, in a film version of the much-honored Stephen Sondheim musical directed by Tim Burton and produced by DreamWorks Studios and Warner Bros. The story, set in Victorian England, concerns a wrongfully imprisoned barber who seeks revenge against the judge who threw him in jail. Golden Globe nominee Helena Bonham Carter portrays Sweeney Todd’s partner-in-crime, the pie-maker Mrs. Lovett, and Alan Rickman plays Todd’s nemesis, the diabolical Judge Turpin. Newcomers Jamie Campbell Bower, Ed Sanders, and Jayne Wisener join Timothy Spall, Olivier winner Laura Michelle Kelly, and Sacha Baron Cohen (as rival barber Pirelli) in the exciting cast. Released on December 21, 2007 in the U.S. to tremendous critical acclaim, and a month later overseas, SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET won the 2008 Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy. It has also been honored with three Oscar nominations, including one for Johnny Depp as Best Actor.
SWEENEY TODD marks Johnny Depp's 6th collaboration with longtime friend Tim Burton; their previous work includes EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, ED WOOD, SLEEPY HOLLOW, CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY, and CORPSE BRIDE. For their first musical venture, the duo wanted to summon the mood of silent films and early horror films, in particular the expressive acting style that required little or no dialogue to convey the story—frequently in interviews, Burton and Depp refer to Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, and Lon Chaney as inspirations. "[Acting without words] is almost a lost art," Johnny tells Mark Salisbury in an interview in the Los Angeles Times. "[John] Barrymore was a master, but the king for me was Lon Chaney. You go back and watch films like THE PENALTY and see this rage and sadness, this huge range of emotions, without the luxury of dialogue." Tim Burton reveals that every day during the shooting, he and Johnny "would cut Sweeney's lines down to the bare minimum." Explains Burton, "Johnny can, just by looking and not saying anything, project pain and sadness and anger and longing. [. . .] The story is told through the eyes and the singing."
Rehearsals and pre-recordings for SWEENEY TODD took place in November and December 2006, dovetailing with the conclusion of Johnny’s work on PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: AT WORLD’S END. “I went into a recording studio with a friend of mine [former Kids’ bandmate Bruce Witkin] and started to record the pieces to see if I could sing,” Johnny told FilmInk’s Philip Berk. He didn’t employ a vocal coach: “I thought it would be better for me to find the character through the process of singing the part as opposed to trying to be a singer.” The experiments proved successful, and principal photography for SWEENEY TODD began on February 5, 2007 at Pinewood Studios in London, and continued through early May. Although filming was delayed briefly in March due to the illness of Johnny Depp's daughter Lily-Rose (she has since made a full recovery), producer Richard Zanuck told Hollywood columnist Army Archerd in June that Tim Burton shot SWEENEY TODD "in 50 days for $50 million"--a remarkably tight schedule and, given currently filming costs, an extremely reasonable budget.
"I've always wanted to do a musical, and SWEENEY TODD is my favorite," says Tim Burton. "Stephen Sondheim's blend of humor, horror and emotion is something that has always connected with me." Adds composer-lyricist Sondheim, "Sometimes a story or stage production has to wait a long time until the right people come together to turn it into a motion picture. That's what has happened with SWEENEY TODD."