JOHNNY-DEPP.org

[i]This encounter first appeared in Johnnydeppfan, and is now hosted here with permission of the webmistress./i]

I don’t usually post on message boards, but I read a few messages now and then, if they appear to be “information-based,” and after seeing John Bogdan’s impassioned account of the Johnny sighting and all the effort he put into the pursuit (after his run, was that FIVE miles?), I felt compelled to share my experience.

I was a guest at the taping. I read on Vicki’s web page a few weeks ago that J.D. would be on I.A.S. I work in a TV station-we operate on SCHEDULES-and I couldn’t find any indication, in any schedule anywhere, that Inside the Actors Studio even aired on 2/25, let alone with Depp as guest. Through one of our programming directories I found a phone number for Bravo and ended up speaking with the person who handles the press guests for the show. She says they don’t publish taping dates for fear of being inundated with “gate crashers” in the small auditorium. In fact, I learned, there are IAS season subscribers who pay to see all the tapings, so it isn’t exactly a secret! Anyway, she said, “Why don’t you come up?” (I live in Orlando.) Didn’t take me long to make plane and hotel reservations and I was on my way to NYC on Monday for a very un-characteristically spontaneous mini-adventure.

The 7pm taping was delayed about 45 minutes because of all the people who showed up.

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Opening like a cheap horror movie with titles that fly out of computer-animated castle facades, The Ninth Gate has an uphill battle to recover respectability from the very beginning – by Rob Blackwelder.

Until “Ninth Gate” turns vapid in the last couple reels, Depp gives a deeply immersed performance, playing Corso’s serpentine nature beautifully and even affecting a deeper, clearer, more educated vocal inflection than we’ve heard from him before. However, his credibility as a book expert is shaky at best. A true connoisseur would closely examine bindings, etc. A true connoisseur wouldn’t smoke while flipping through fragile, 600-year-old volumes, letting ash fall on the pages.

Copyright Contactmusic.com Ltd 2005

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By Johnny Depp

An appreciation of Kerouac, Burroughs, Cassady and the other bastards who ruined my life

There I was, age thirteen, eyes shut tight, listening intently to Frampton Comes Alive over and over again, as some kind of pubescent mantra that helped to cushion the dementia of just how badly I wanted to whisk Bambi, the beautiful cheerleader, away from the wedge of peach melba that was the handsome, hunky football hero. …

I was daydreaming of taking her out behind the 7-Eleven to drink Boone’s Farm strawberry-apple wine and kiss until our mouths were raw. ZZZZRRRIIIPP!! was the sound I heard that ripped me from that tender moment. My brother Danny, ten years my senior and on the verge of committing fratricide, having had more than enough of “Do you feel like we do?,” promptly seized the vinyl off record player and with a violent heave chucked the sacred album into the cluttered abyss of my room.

“No more,” he hissed. “I can’t let you listen to that shit anymore!”

I sat there snarling at him in that deeply expressive way that only teens possess, decompressing too fast back into reality. He grabbed a record out of his own collection and threw it on.

“Try this … you’re better than that stuff. You don’t have to listen to that shit just ’cause other kids do.”

“OK, fucker,” I thought, “bring it on … let’s have it!”

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What we have here is the product of two men. After his screenplay for “Seven” was produced, Andrew Kevin Walker’s retelling of this Washington Irving story was sold and promptly sat on the shelf for a few years. Director Tim Burton, after a long string of artistic and commercial successes, had a pair of setbacks. His cinematic adaptation of the “Mars Attacks!” trading cards was all sight-gags, and no soul. Recently, he spent a year in pre-production on a Superman movie, only to have Warner Bros pull the plug a couple of months before filming would begin. In a no-brainer, the director and the script found each other. There are two things that make this the perfect Burton project. The first is the latest addition to his gallery of beloved outcasts, Ichabod Crane (Johnny Depp)- by Ron Wells for Film Threat.

In this version of the tale, Crane is not a schoolteacher, but a New York City constable in 1799 (though still a foppish girly-man). At this time, superstition and piety still rule the populace. After a childhood trauma, Crane has rejected both in favor of science and reason. When attempting to apply both to police work, the would-be forensic scientist is ridiculed and sent upstate to apply his “detecting” skills to a series of murders in a small village called “Sleepy Hollow”.

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ust as a drug trip, the day was an upward motion from reality to a dream, with its rise and its flash when I met Johnny and remembering our meeting when I went to bed after a very special trip.

THE PRESS CONFERENCE: A bad beginning. For the beginning of the day, I’m not really lucky. The press conference is over-crowded and I couldn’t enter the room. Anyway, I didn’t have the right pass. The access is only authorized to the journalists with the pink pass and I had the white. But there was another way to watch the press conference. On the first floor of The Festival Palace, there was a place where you can sit on deck-chairs (as if you were on the beach) and follow the press conference live as it is broadcast on TV Festival ! ! ! A lot of people agree with me when I say that’s the best way to hear and record a press conference. You’re well installed and the sound is better for your recorder. That’s how I saw and recorded the Fear and Loathing press conference. Vicki will put some clips from the conference soon with this report.

THE MOVIE: Let the delirium enter your mind. SYNOPSIS – The gonzo journalist Raoul Duke is scheduled to write an article about a motorcycle race in Las Vegas. He travels there with his attorney, Dr Gonzo, driving a crimson convertible full of every sort of drug and pharmaceutical product.

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I met Johnny and Terry Gilliam on their press tour for Fear and Loathing. They did an interview at our radio station and I thought I would pass a picture along to you. Johnny was the nicest guest we have ever had at the station and Terry was constantly cracking jokes and laughing. Along with the souvenir picture, I salvaged one of Johnny’s cigarette butts and have it in a test tube. This is not something I normally do, but hey, you take what you can get.

I knew that there was a possibility that Johnny and Terry Gilliam would stop by the station that evening for the interview, but there was more of a possibility that they would call in or not come by at all. Knowing my luck, it would be the latter. Unfortunately I had spent the previous evening at a local “watering” hole and was suffering the next day from too much “water”. Clad in jeans and a shirt freshly crumpled from the floor, I stumbled into work unprepared for an actual face to face meeting with anyone out of the ordinary. One hour before we were off the air we got the news, from our “Italian connection,” that they were coming by after all. Nervousness set in. No amount of makeup or hair-styling could help me at this point. At least the dirty shirt had aired out.

Terry and Johnny arrived and I was sent to bring them into the studio.

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I met Johnny on Sunday, April the 5th of 1998: he was there to give an award at the ending ceremony of the Paris film festival, where his friend Sean Penn was the President of the Jury. I was at this festival but people without invitation weren’t allowed to be present in the theater for the ending ceremony, so I decided to wait a moment behind the barrier to see some stars. And then, he arrived (with his director Roman Polanski). I was totally crazy because it wasn’t provided he would be there.

Briefly, he was exactly as Sam has written: very nice, generous and smiling with everybody (when the guy by my side gave to him a 1 dollar banknote to sign it, he said joking “am I worth only this price?”). He signed lots of autographs and allowed lots of pictures. And when a man who was with him told him he had to enter the theater, he wanted to stay longer to sign other autographs and take pictures with fans who were behind the other barrier. An angel!!! (Contrary to Sean Penn who hadn’t stopped when he had passed very quickly in front of fans, before Johnny). He was the star who stayed the longest time with fans, and when he was gone, everyone said he was great. Since this day, I love him still more. I took 2 photos of Johnny, but I didn’t talk to him because I was too impressed to tell him something interesting,

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Background: Summer-Fall 1995 I went to the Viper Room a few times, the energy was amazing! I went on December 31st. Sandra Bernhardt was performing, which was terrific.

Suddenly, I turned-around and I saw Kate Moss sitting on the back of the booth near the bathrooms, and I said to myself “He’s gotta be here!” I looked down from Kate, and there he was, sitting in the booth drinking wine. Hair hanging in his face, being kind of sullen.

Edward Scissorhands and What’s Eating Gilbert Grape have touched me deeply. I so wanted to tell him, but there was no getting near him with all the bodyguards. Flea showed-up. It was quite the scene.

Nevertheless, the crowd (and bodyguards) became casual by 2AM, when I was coming out of the men’s room, and there he was, standing right next to me: tee shirt and cords, very Johnny. I lingered for a moment, as he was talking with someone. I considered approaching him, but didn’t want to be rude by butting- in.

Suddenly, he headed-off down those stairs, into the night. Maybe some other time!

Barry

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A few years ago, when I was the Marketing Director for John Tesh?s music I heard that Johnny Depp?s trailer was parked right outside my office on the Paramount lot. He was shooting a film on a stage right behind the Mae West building where I worked.

That put me in a bit of a fix. I had a policy against any sort of star deference on the lot. It was rampant and kind of sickening and I wanted no part of it. I routinely passed Kevin Costner, Niles from Fraiser, Tom Cruise and others while walking around to the catering truck or on errands and we would smile and nod, like anyone else. I once had a temp assignment working for Patrick Stewart. Being no fan of Star Trek, I didn?t know who he was until someone told me later that morning. At lunch, Patrick and his girlfriend came back all lit up. Apparently Pierce Brosnan was right outside, having also eaten at the Commissary. I didn?t say anything.

?Pierce Brosnan!? Patrick told me. “Don?t you like him??

?I don?t know who that is.?

?James Bond!? his girlfriend blurted.

?James Bond! Don?t you know James Bond?? Patrick asked me, leaning over my desk to make the point right in my face.

?Listen,? I said, ?I didn?t know who you were until about fifteen minutes ago.?

But Johnny Depp?I knew who he was. And he was on my short list.

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