12 h, sep 13, 2021 y - NOVINKY CZ Johnny Depp Sometimes I feel like an overgrown toddler Interview

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FROM NOVINKY CZECH:

Translated from the original Czech using Google Translate.

Johnny Depp: Sometimes I feel like an overgrown toddler

by Vera Miskova

The Karlovy Vary festival, of which Právo is the main media partner, has not seen such a welcoming and friendly star and such enthusiasm from the audience since 2013, when John Travolta made Karlovy Vary dance. Johnny Depp (58) was greeted enthusiastically by the people upon his evening arrival, but the next day he literally entered a boiling cauldron in front of the Thermal. He gave an interview to Magazín.

The gender-imbalanced crowd, in which girls and women of all ages clearly had the upper hand, screamed, jumped, children hung from trees, adults crowded at barricades and in windows.

Their wait was then amply rewarded when Depp, aka Jack Sparrow, arrived and spent an incredibly long time signing autographs, taking selfies with fans, walking from one side of the venue to the other, and greeting everyone so warmly that the girls cried and it seemed like the cries of "Johnny! Johnny!" would never stop.

It was no different in the hall, where he played a funny "microphone theft" scene, and when two lucky people who got an autograph at the last minute when Depp left cried with happiness, he gave them a few extra seconds.

And again and again, everywhere he went, people waited patiently for him, even if he was sometimes late because he was chatting with someone before leaving the hotel.

"He's so relaxed that he's a little slow," star coordinator Veronika Gočová told me as we waited in the lounge of the Pupp Hotel for an interview.

I guess it's pointless to ask you how you feel here?

It's not unnecessary at all, I want to say it. I'm happy here, amazed! I was overwhelmed by the wonderful, warm welcome. Kindness, care and support. Such a gesture immediately humbles a person. It's the audience that has the power, they are the reason why films are made.

The hero of the documentary Pot of Gold: A Few Drinks with Shane MacGowan says in the film that he once wanted to save Irish music.
What was your goal at the beginning of your career?

To earn money for rent. Definitely. I worked as a pump attendant at a gas station, I worked as a construction worker, I was a musician, but sometimes I didn't even have a job and I could be kicked out of my apartment at any moment.

And then my friend Nick Cage said to me: "Come on, I'll introduce you to my agent, I think you have acting talent." I got on a game show - and then it started to pick up. Slowly, but surely. So it was a coincidence, a mistake, and the mistake continued. I, who should be pumping gas into someone's car, just had my moment of luck.

The second film you screened in Vary, Minamata, is the story of a photographer who ruined everything with booze and irresponsibility and then got one last chance.
What do you think about reboots and last chances?

I don't want to sound too metaphysical, but it's the same with man as it is with nature. If you take two flowers, you see that each one grows differently. It's the same with people. There are no two people who are the same, and I would say that one has to be really careful before one starts to differentiate, to judge them.

Otherwise, it could end up like when you incorrectly call a flower a rare orchid, and after two hundred years someone discovers that it is something completely different. For a person, two hundred years is too late, we must, albeit cautiously, try to distinguish and recognize people earlier. Sometimes they lie, but sometimes it just seems that way...

We also see in the film that there were things in Shane MacGowan's life that he couldn't explain even to his parents, that he couldn't describe what was going on in his life. Is there anything in the life of a movie star that you couldn't explain even to those closest to you?

It's nice that you put me in the category of movie stars, but I've never seen myself that way. I even have a problem with it. Life before everything that happened during my film career was so random. You just kind of floundered around in it, like you just flounder in life...

You know, Marlon Brando said that acting is a special job for a grown man. And that's very true. A special job for a grown man, for a man. That's one of those problems that I can't really explain.

I know a lot of people, and I'm one of them, who I call overgrown toddlers. When a toddler stands up, you feel like they're drunk because they're swaying. Just a giant, overgrown toddler, that's how I feel sometimes.

You've made a lot of films that are loved by people across generations, including children...

Yes, including the children, great!

Admit it yourself, there are many of them: starting with Chocolate, through all the Pirates of the Caribbean, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Fantastic Beasts and even Alice in Wonderland. And that's not all of them, and some have had more than one sequel.

I only contributed a modest amount to Alice in Wonderland, it was a huge collective effort. It's everyone's work, as an actor, director or musician you only contribute your bit.

But I met some pirates and Captain Jacks here yesterday. That was really cute. You know, it's a strange thing: Captain Jack is a kind of primal entity that I've been able to find somewhere in my head, and I've become very close to him.

Every character you play stays with you. They don't pay rent, but they stay. Pirates of the Caribbean a little more. It was a good movie for my life in many ways, it brought me a lot of positive things.

When you're not used to making these kinds of films, you have to learn a lot. It's hard and it can be a little weird. But no one should complain about success, so I was just very lucky with Jack Sparrow.

So you still live with him?

There's one thing I can do no matter what, it applies everywhere, and no one can stop me from doing it. Travel with a Captain Jack costume in a box. When I have it with me, there are always plenty of opportunities to say thank you.

I'm going somewhere, I'll call ten minutes in advance so there's no press, and I'll say, Captain Jack would like to visit a children's hospital. And because I can do this, Captain Jack will always be in me, and as long as I can, I'll go and try to put a smile on children's faces. Because that's the right thing to do when you have the opportunity.

I won't play golf in my free time when I can go somewhere and help make people laugh.

Are you planning something similar?

I like the time I'm living in now because there's freedom in it. You get rid of everything that the whole Hollywood machine expects of you.

I haven't been going to parties for a long time anyway, but now I don't even have to do any business with those people - and that frees me up a lot.

I think there are other ways to look at a movie. Definitely better than what the big studios can offer. Because the studios are limited by their own formulas and their own ideas. They are limited because they have to make sure that everything works out mathematically, that the movie either makes people laugh or scares them, because then they make a lot of money. That's the game.

It's very easy to rely on formulas, but I think it's much more interesting to try different approaches.

So what would you most like to do right now?

I would like to make movie trailers, not the movies themselves. To make a good trailer for a movie that doesn't exist and never will.

I once had this idea of making Titanic. With the exact same cast, but with a minimal budget, no budget really. Leo and Kate would be standing on the edge of a bathtub and someone would spray water on them from a shower. I would have enjoyed making a little Warhol can soup out of that huge thing.

For seventeen dollars, to remake, shot by shot, what Cameron did, but on a phone and with a shower. To take buckets of paint and repaint the tiles... It's so absurd that it interests me much more than anything else.

In the movie Minamata we saw what it means to disappoint expectations. How do you protect yourself against the fear of disappointment?

In every job, even the one you love, there comes a point when it starts to eat away at you. I remember the fear of failing well, and I remember how it held me back. It's strange. You have to get to the point where you care so much about the outcome that it doesn't matter at all.

You have to let go of everything and say to yourself - I apologize for the words - to hell with it, fuck it, I can't afford these feelings, I just have to do what I have to do. Once you relieve yourself like that, freedom will come.

In Minamata we also saw how cynical the world can be. How can we prevent a person from becoming a cynic?

You have to walk all those hobbit paths, you have to learn a lot about Hollywood, about what goes on there. You basically have to overcome that cynicism, like the fear of failing.

You can be cynical about something as absurd and abstract as Hollywood and fame. But the world is beautiful, if only people would stop and look around. I think there's nothing wrong with being able to breathe in the morning.

It's certainly worth it for my brain and heart to pick some battles. To choose how much of that invisible burden I'll carry on my own shoulders and what I'll let go of and tell myself that it's not up to me, but to someone else.

Boredom and not having any meaning in life are killers! When my kids were little and sometimes said they were bored, I always wanted them to find their own entertainment. If my brain wasn't constantly occupied with something, I would probably curl up in a corner somewhere in the fetal position and cry like a newborn.

You must always know where you are going, you must know your truth and always move forward.

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