nov 26, 2014 - DETAILS MAGAZINE
HOLLYWOOD MAVERICK
Johnny Depp
Interview,
Photo Shoot
Video
Description:
Johnny Depp was the front cover and inside interview photo feature.
It is the December 2014/ January 2015 edition and was first available on 26 November 2014.
The full article is now impossible to find online - the link is to a Daily Mail Article about the interview and a pdf of the actual interview is attached.
PERHAPS YOU'VE HEARD THAT JOHNNY DEPP IS IN A SLUMP, THAT HIS RECENT FILMS HAVEN'T LIVED UP TO EXPECTATIONS. WHOSE? AT 51, THE ONLY THING DEPP EXPECTS IS TO CHALLENGE CONVENTION AND HIMSELF. THE COMING YEAR WILL REMIND US ALL OF HIS ARTISTIC RANGE--THE BIG BAD WOLF IN INTO THE WOODS, A COMEDIC ROGUE IN MORTDECAI, WHITEY BULGER IN BLACK MASS AND THE POWER OF THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX OFFICE.
"As Marlon once so beautifully fucking said to me, life is a birdsong. That's stuck with me." Like his friend, mentor, and fellow outsider Brando, Johnny Depp is poetic about the listen-closely-or-you'll-miss-it, crushingly beautiful, ephemeral nature of existence-and also a little punk. "For everybody, the clock's ticking. The main thing is whether you sit there and stare at the clock in fear of your ultimate demise- which is pointless--or you just live." If Depp speaks like a man free of fear, it's because the elusive star recently passed beyond the reach of critics (internal and otherwise) and his obsessive dedication to craft. "What is really satisfying is, like Marlon, getting to that place where he just didn't give a fuck," Depp says, explaining the evolution of his emancipation. "First, I reached a point where I cared so much and was so diligent in terms of approaching the work. Then you get to where you care so fucking much that it gets goddamn beleaguering, you know? But then a great thing happens. Suddenly you care enough to not give a fuck, because not giving a fuck, that's the total liberation. Being game to try anything." For evidence of his newfound freedom, consider the wildly varied, whiplash-inducing transformations he's undertaken over the past year. "It's been in-sane," says Depp, who returned to Los Angeles from London late the night before after wrapping Alice in Wonderland: Through the Looking Glass. "From Whitey Bulger to the Mad Hatter, you can imagine the schizophrenia.
(Middle not copied over)
"They expect you to live up to some race you happened to be in and won accidentally. From that first second, you're nothing more than a commod-ity. They have expectations of another Pirates. It's great if something works. Boy, that's killer. But God, to have that as your design ... it's ugly, I think." The iconoclastic Dep hasn't lost the taste for the chase, even if his race has a field of one and a route he redraws as he goes. He's happy to indulge (and even revisit) big-budget films if the character speaks to him, yet he's happier still incubating passion projects with his production company, Infinitum Nihil, including It Only Rains at Night by River's Edge writer Neal Jimenez. "I stole that off an agent's desk, Idon't know, man, 25 years ago," Dep says, laugh-ing. "And I've always either wanted to be in it or direct the damn thing. It's so beautiful and strange." Depp's been working at an exhausting clip, which is particularly taxing for a performer who internalizes every character he plays. "Marlon said, 'Be careful, we only have so many faces in our pockets,'" he says, referring to Brando's famous caution about actors not squandering creative capital. "I understood what he meant-and he's right. But I'm not running out, you know?" What Depp is losing- not that he had much to begin with-is tolerance for playing the game. "The process I love. The other stuff ... I can deal with being a fugitive for a bit, but I don't know how much longer a human being really wants to be that. Actors essentially have to peddle their ass to sell the movie. All the by-products or occupational hazards of the thing ..." Depp lets out a whistling sigh. He's too busy for all that shit. "At a certain point, one has to dig deep and go, 'Man, it is a birdsong.
