Johnny Depp Talks John Dillinger

Thursday 2nd July 2009 - 15:03:24

Johnny Depp may be one of the most popular actors and box office gold but it wasn't always the case for the forty six year old who is currently promoting his new gangster movie Public Enemies.

"I went through twenty years of basically in what the industry define as failures, so for the best part of twenty years I was defined as box office poison.

"I didn't change anything in terms of my process but that little film Pirates of the Caribbean came around and I thought 'yeah I've got to play a pirate for my kiddies'.

But with Pirates of the Caribbean Depp turned his box office fortunes around, Dead Man's Chest is the third biggest grossing movie of all time breaking the $1 billion barrier, and since then his star has done nothing but rise.

"But I created him in the same way that I created all the other characters, I nearly got fired, thank god I didn't because it changed my life," the actor said. "But I'm super thankful that that radical change happened but it's not like I went out of my way to make it happen."

After a break of over a year Johnny Depp is back on our cinema screens as bank robber John Dillinger. Teaming up with filmmaker Michael Mann the pair celebrate the dangerous lifestyle of a man who captivated a nation that was on it's knees with Depression.

Dillinger robbed the banks that impoverished them as he outsmarted the authorities that had failed to find a solution to the hard times that had taken hold of the country.

"First and foremost since I was ten years old I have had a fascination with John Dillinger, I don't know why and it's probably not a healthy one but I did, there was something about that twinkle in his eye and there was something about his charm," Depp explained.

"I was intrigued by the idea that this guy was called public enemy number one but, if you really think about it, was never an enemy of the public ever and that I found intriguing and challenging."

Depp takes on the role of the charismatic Dillinger who heists and jail breakouts captured the imagination of a country as they admired someone who wasn't afraid to say no, and this was one of the factors that drew Depp to the role.

"I think, especially with a guy like John Dillinger, where we were in 1933, it's not unlike where we are now, the banks were the enemies and they were taking the knees out from underneath everyone another way of putting it is their lives were being ripped out from under them.

"And there's John Dillinger, he has been in jail for ten years for some youthful, ignorant and drunken crime, and he arrives on the scene in the ultimate existential arena and says 'I'm going to stand up against these people' so, I think, what was fascinating of me was the guy that says 'I ain't gonna take it I don't care who you are'."

With roles such as Ed Wood, Donnie Brasco and John Wilmot the 2nd Earl of Rochester Depp has almost made a career out of playing real life characters but, as the actor reveals, it's a job that comes with a heavy weight of responsibility.

"It's even more so because of the weight of responsibility to that person who did exist there's some sense of responsibility to their legacy," said Depp.

"With John Dillinger there is an enormous amount of information on the guy, we know where he was at 12.02 when the banks were robbed and all that, but there's a great gap as to who he was there are endless photographs of him but there is no audio there's just an attitude that you get so that was a dig, how to I find this man? How do I find how he speaks? What does he sound like?

"But what made it for me was I made the connection that John Dillinger was born in Indiana and raised in Mooresville Indiana, just a couple of hours from where I was born and raised and it was that point I thought 'I hear his voice now', because it's not all that different, he was my grandfather who drove a bus in the day and ran moonshine at night, he was my stepfather who did time at the state penitentiary I knew his voice then."

But Michael Mann help with the authenticity as they were able to shoot in many of the iconic locations that are associated with Dillinger.