Is Johnny Depp's career over? Do not be so sure
Now that a British judge has confirmed that calling the star a "wife beater" was substantially true, will Hollywood kick him out?
Now what about Johnny Depp? Once Hollywood's quirkiest heartthrob, the Fantastic Beasts and Pirates of the Caribbean star faces career ruin after the Supreme Court ruled that allegations that he had beaten his ex-wife Amber Heard were "substantially true. ".
“It's one thing for Charles Bukowski, one of Depp's heroes, to misbehave and be controversial. Charles Bukowski never sued a newspaper, "says Variety executive editor Steven Gaydos, following the failure of Depp's legal action against The Sun for its description of him as a" wife beater. "
“He never made that fatal mistake. In Depp's case, I won't call it a fatal error. I'll call it a big strategic mistake. If you run a company based on your image and Johnny Depp coin as a heartthrob, bad boy and a bit naughty, crossing the line, hot guy ... and [unsuccessfully] suing someone for portraying you as a wife beater, it is enormously damaging. "
There is never a good time to lose a domestic violence defamation case. For Depp, 57, though, the timing is particularly bleak, capping a decade of dazzling decline that includes his 2018 ouster from the Pirates of the Caribbean series. It's only been 10 years since he seemed to confirm, without question, his touch by taking Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland to a global record of $ 1 billion.
Could any other actor have kept his dignity playing the Mad Hatter in a crazy Burton jamboree? However, in hindsight, it is clear that Alice in Wonderland was simply a final moment of glory. Thereafter, Depp's years of rigorously living up to the archetype of the tousled-haired rake caught up with him with a vengeance.
The fall, when it came, was surprisingly quick. The flop followed the flop, starting, just a few months after Alice in Wonderland, with The Tourist, with Angelina Jolie. And then came the triple disasters of The Rum Diary (where she met Heard), Dark Shadows, and The Lone Ranger.
The Lone Ranger's $ 250 million failure of 2013, in which the star applied black and white face paint to represent the scout, will have been particularly painful. Depp was desperate for another cash cow franchise to join Pirates of the Caribbean. He needed the extra income to maintain a lifestyle that had more in common with that of a dissolute French monarch than with an A-lister with dwindling commercial appeal.
Depp seemed to take pride in his debauchery and speculated that he was spending $ 2 million a month on a combination of custody payments to his former partner Vanessa Paradis, the maintenance of a 37-acre estate in Provence that included an entire village, and the maintenance of $ 22. million yacht. When, in a 2018 interview, Rolling Stone brought up rumors of his generous spending on wine, Depp leaned toward his persona as a high-income spender. "It is an insult to say that I spent $ 30,000 on wine," he said. "Because it was so much more."
"Johnny Depp is almost 60 years old. He seems to be going through the all-time midlife crisis," says Gaydos. “Although it is difficult to call the middle-aged 60.
“He's really boxed himself in a lot. The magnitude of detail in the Johnny Depp portrait that we have now is not beautiful. Beautiful is a word that until 10 years ago you would have used to describe him: a beautiful man, physically beautiful. "
The looks and cherub glow that lit up his performances on '90s hits like Edward Scissorhands and Ed Wood are no more. Instead, he has been plagued by rumors of lethargy and poor punctuality on set and even whispers that he received his lines through a headset during the making of 2017's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales.
“We want to bring a new energy and vitality. I love [Pirates] movies, but part of the reason [reboot writers Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese] are so interesting is that we want to kick their pants, "said the studio's production manager for Disney, Sean Bailey. "And that is what I have entrusted to you."
Certainly Depp looked bloated and dejected on the steps of London's High Court. He also won't have had much restful sleep since the loss of the libel case, which has led to speculation that he could be fired from the still-untitled third Fantastic Beasts film in Hertfordshire.
"It is hugely damaging," says Gaydos. Could it be cut from a big movie franchise like Fantastic Beasts? Yes. Could you miss out on important promotions for products like Dior? Yes. All of these are damaging setbacks that he has caused himself 100 percent. "
Depp is pursuing a second defamation case, in the United States and against Amber Heard for a Washington Post op-ed titled “I spoke out against sexual violence and faced the wrath of our culture. That has to change ”. He claims that the piece led to him being eliminated from Pirates of the Caribbean.
With the lawsuit still pending, the US media has largely refrained from declaring Depp a broken blush. In that context, it is worth noting that this is the story of an American star who loses a case in a British court. It remains to be seen to what extent the shockwaves return to Los Angeles. With America consumed by coverage of the presidential election, Depp's defamation defeat has yet to be diagnosed there as a setback for the end of his career.
Much will depend on how the public reacts to the trial, says Gaydos.
"It is a controversial judicial decision," he says. “It is not as clear as some things could be. I mean, there are some things that cause a person to get canceled from the business today. And I would not say with certainty that this court decision is one of them. It's enormously damaging ... I think Depp isn't done. I think it's badly damaged. It's an own goal, obviously ”.
"He's going through a very difficult time," adds veteran publicist Dennis Davidson of DDA Consulting in an email. "Domestic violence is rightly toxic and will find little sympathy anywhere."
"The hope is always that we are moving forward, that eventually, abuse allegations are dealt with the severity they deserve, and that Hollywood will really take into account the damage inflicted when such people are allowed to occupy positions of power" says the critic Clarisse Loughrey.
“But sadly, that is not the world we live in yet. The movie industry, and almost every other industry on the planet, works actively to protect abusers. We know this, victims are told, over and over again, that their trauma doesn't matter. Two years ago, a movie directed by a man with a long history of allegations of sexual abuse was nominated for Best Picture.
“The media still conducts flattering interviews with Woody Allen. Mel Gibson is still a star. I have been dismayed to see that the Depp case has turned into charlatanism. But I was not particularly surprised either. It's easy to state now that Depp's career is over, but that doesn't exactly fit the narratives we see over and over again in this industry. Such powerful men simply cannot lose. "
Amid overspending and poor movie choices, Depp's biggest mistake may have been identifying too much with his heroes. He adores Bukowski and Hunter S Thompson, renegade writers who dined on his reputation for recklessness. And he clearly sees himself as an outlaw in the tradition of Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, on whom he based the character of Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean (Depp also narrated the audiobook of Richards' memoirs).
Depp, however, is neither a transgressive journalist writing in the pre-politically correct 1970s nor a rock icon who can get away with “cocaine for breakfast” (one of the details of Depp's lifestyle that will emerge in the tribunals). Movie stars have different standards. Nobody takes their kids to Rolling Stones concerts. Yet families are the market that Disney is pursuing with Fantastic Beasts. Depp seems to have lost sight of what kind of beast he is himself.
Is there a way back? In the short term, the danger is that Depp's professional support network will fade away. In 2016, he left his former UTA agents to sign for CAA, the industry leader. Since then, CAA has come under fire for allowing misbehavior from its customers and was implicated in the #MeToo scandal.
In 2018, Courtney Love claimed that she was blacklisted by CAA for her criticism of Harvey Weinstein 13 years earlier. CAA has publicly apologized "to anyone the agency defrauds" amid reports that it continued to send actresses to private meetings with Weinstein despite being warned of their behavior. Having been through all of that, will he still be faithful to Depp?
Warner Brothers, for their part, may, as noted above, decide that it is prudent to sever ties with Depp when filming resumes on the untitled third Fantastic Beasts film at its Leavesden compound. The Harry Potter spinoff is already mired in controversy following JK Rowling's comments about trans people and "gay laundering" claims about her neutered portrayal of young Dumbledore.
Kicking Depp wouldn't be as disturbing as it might initially seem. His character, Dark Wizard Grindelwald, is a shapeshifter after all, and was initially played by Colin Farrell. Trading Depp for a less troublesome star will be a tempting way out.
Either way, how can Depp achieve long-term redemption? His lawyers have promised to appeal the "perverse and perplexing" ruling of the High Court. Therefore, a public campaign of contrition seems unlikely.
"I don't know if at this point in life he is interested in reversing the course or controlling it," says Gaydos. “You can get away with that image as long as you don't hurt anyone else.
“If you are hurting yourself, if you are damaging your liver, that's one thing. If you are damaging someone else's liver, it is someone else. His ego, pride, brand, image were all greatly damaged by Sun's description of him as a wife beater. He felt compelled to defend himself. It was a big strategic mistake. "
