Title: Public Enemies
Author: Chris Nashawaty
Publication: US – Entertainment Weekly
Issue: January 2009
YOU COULD SAY being an outlaw runs in Johnny Depp’s blood. After all, his grandfather ran moonshine on the back roads of Kentucky during Prohibition. So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that the actor jumped at the chance to play John Dillinger in Public Enemies. “Dillinger was one of those guys, like Charlie Chaplin and Evel Knievel, that I was fascinated with at a young age,” says Depp. ‘And because of my grandfather, the character was pretty easy for me to connect to. In a way this movie was a salute to him.”
Based on a book by Bryan Burrough, Enemies is a cat-and-mouse thriller about the early days of the FBI, and one agent’s pursuit of the Depression-era bank robber whose dizzy reign of stickups and near escapes ended in a hail of bullets outside of Chicago’s Biograph Theater in 1934. Dillinger lived fast, died young, and left not only a handsome corpse but a legacy as one of the most notorious criminals of the 20th century.
Directed by Michael Mann (Heat, The Insider), and costarring Christian Bale as the dashing federal agent Melvin Purvis, Public Enemies might sound like a blood-soaked chapter of ancient history. But the film’s themes couldn’t be more timely: Dillinger was sticking up banks at a time when people weren’t exactly rooting for them. As a result, he became something larger than life—a rock star with a tommy gun. “Some people might disagree, but I think he was a real-life Robin Hood,” says Depp, who just finished playing the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, due in 2010. “I mean, the guy wasn‘t completely altruistic, but he went out of his way not to kill anybody. He definitely gave a lot of that money away I love the guy”
Still hip—deep in the editing stage of the film, which he’s readying for its July 2009 release, Mann remains in awe of his two leading men. “Johnny has courage and immense power: its all about the spontaneity of the moment for him. Christian works in a totally different way. He becomes the character so totally that he’s that person 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The accent, everything.”
Mann shot on the actual locations where Dillinger and Purvis made headlines, because, he says, “when your hand touches the same doorknob Dillinger’s did, it starts to talk to you.” The director even managed to get his hands on a still preserved suitcase left behind by Dillinger after one of his narrow getaways. “All of the dress shirts were still folded perfectly,” says Depp. “It was a real insight into the guy. Because everything was ready to go at a moment’s notice. It was just economical and beautiful.”
Depp even got to wear the pair of pants that Dillinger had on when he was finally caught and riddled with bullets. “It was amazing,” he says. “And -get this – we’re the same size!” Like we said, the man was born to play the part.
Questions for Johnny
EW: How did this movie come about?
JD: It came at the time of the writers’ strike. A wave of fear gripped the industry. And out of nowhere this script arrived with a note: “Michael Mann would like to talk to you about playing Dillinger”
EW: What was your reaction to hearing that?
JD: Well, certainly intrigued. Intrigued by both Dillinger and Michael Mann. It’s always interesting to get in the ring with a director and explore their process and see what does it for him.
EW: And what does it for him?
JD: The details of the details of the details. [Laughs] They should invent a word to describe it, because it’s not just details, it teeters on microscopic obsession with every molecule of the moment. Which is admirable, you know? You got to salute that.
EW: So what details of this character did you try to latch onto?
JD: The interesting thing is, John Dillinger really became a criminal almost by accident The two main ingredients for his initial incarceration were ignorance and youth. There are moments in life when those two walk hand in hand in a very tight grip. When he went inside, the world was one thing, and when he came out, it was Technicolor. Women dressed differently. It was a different planet. Prison at that time was college for criminals. He went in and basically learned how to rob banks. By all accounts, he wasn’t the best student initially but he got the hang of it.
EW: What was your favorite scene to shoot?
JD: Well, Let’s just say, how often do you get to stand on the running board of an old 1932 Buick blasting a 50·round clip from a Thompson submachine gun? When do you get to do that without getting into trouble for it? And with Michael, you get to do it again and again and again.
