Some interviews about "Corpse Bride" from the press-junket on the Toronto Festival, 10.09.2005

1. INTERVIEW: Johnny Depp on "Tim Burton's The Corpse Bride"

Ethan Aames
http://www.cinecon.com/news.php?id=0509131


Despite the bad boy image he used to project during his younger years, Johnny Depp comes off as a soft-spoken, shy artist when it comes to doing interviews.
That’s not to say that he’s a bad interview. In fact, I would say that our interviews with Johnny Depp contain some of the most insightful and interesting takes on the art of acting.

Johnny reunites with his "Edward Scissorhands", "Ed Wood", "Sleepy Hollow", and "Charlie & The Chocolate Factory" director Tim Burton in "The Corpse Bride" a stop-motion animated feature where he provides the voice of Victor Hugo, a lonesome man who is caught in an unusual love triangle involving a polite, rich girl named Victoria (Emily Watson) and a bride from beyond the grave (Helena Bonham Carter.)
Below he talks about working with Tim again, as well as going from the unknown cool indie actor to one of Hollywood’s most sought after stars.

Q: We see you really get into character in "Charlie & The Chocolate Factory". But when you’re doing a voice, do you have to get into character for this character even though you’re not playing him physically?

Johnny DEPP: I guess under normal circumstances you would. I was somewhat remiss only because I was so focused on "Charlie [& The Chocolate Factory]". I was so focused on the [Willy] Wonka character. Somehow, in my mind, I thought we would do "The Corpse Bride" in a couple of months. Suddenly, one day on the set, Tim comes up to me and says, “What about tonight? We’re going to record something for "Corpse Bride". I say, "Yeah, we can". I had no character so I sat him down and grilled him for 15 minutes. That’s how I found the guy.

Q: Did looking at the puppet help?

Johnny DEPP: That was one of the great luxuries. When I arrived that night to do the recording for the session, a picture was standing there and I got to meet the puppet. It was beautiful; really inspiring.

Q: Were you thinking of anyone when you were doing your character?

Johnny DEPP: No, not particularly. I was just trying to save my own ass basically for being ill-prepared. Tim was so helpful, as he always is, with the idea. He’s a character that’s not so far away from other characters that I’ve played in the past for Tim, like Edward Scissorhands. He’s sort of an outsider, bumbling, insecure, nervous – a lot like me in life.

Q: Was there one theme with Victor in the movie that you identified most with?

Johnny DEPP: The feeling of failure, I suppose. Feeling inept and unable to be understood. It’s a pretty consistent theme with a lot of people’s lives. Victor represented, in the same way Edward Scissorhands did that, that emotion of not quite feeling comfortable and that universal feeling of growing up. We all drag that feeling for the rest of our days.

Q: What is it that brings you and Tim together and do you have any plans to do anything else in the future?

Johnny DEPP: I hope so. It’s all up to him if he gives me the job. I’ve said this before but it’s the only analogy that works: working with Tim is like going home to this place that is very comfortable, even with knowledge that there’s a lot of risks you have to take and you really have to be prepared to explore but there’s great comfort there and great safety there. The fact that he keeps casting me is either huge luck or a great mistake on his part.

Q: What’s your reaction to the success of "Charlie & The Chocolate Factory" being your 2nd biggest movie after "Pirates of the Caribbean"?

Johnny DEPP: I’ve learned to condition myself and not have any expectations in terms of box-office or results to that degree because as you all well know - as well as I do - that that kind of thing escaped me for many, many years. It’s relatively a new experience. I have more than a couple of people going to see my films.

Q: You really don’t pay attention to box-office numbers?

Johnny DEPP: That whole part of the process is so far into me, so distant, that literally two or three weeks ago, I called my agent and said, "Is "Charlie" doing O.K.?" And she said, "Uh, yeah. It’s going to cross the 200 million mark domestically". I didn’t know what that meant and so I said, "Is that good?"

Q: Is there a surge now in your popularity?

Johnny DEPP: I’ve noticed a bit of a change in the attitude towards me from the operation of the industry which is pretty interesting.

Q: Does that mean everybody wants you in their movie?

Johnny DEPP: I don’t know about that but for example, every time Tim wanted to cast me in his films, he had to fight like a bastard with the studio to cast me. He was telling me today that the Warners people came to see him in London. They were like, "Let’s talk about cast". He says, "Yeah, let’s talk about cast. What do you think about Johnny?" They were like, [pauses] "Yeah, O.K., good".

Q: The last two movies, "Pirates" and "Charlie", had you playing characters that were way over the top. Do you prefer to play things closer to you or have nothing to do with you?

Johnny DEPP: Any actor with any semblance of sanity or insanity will tell you that our biggest fear is to go anywhere near where you are. It’s O.K. to use certain truths. It’s a great challenge and I’ve touched on it here and there in more character-y parts, like "Libertine" coming up. I, more than anything, am more interested in exploring one area and saying that it’s territory covered and seeing what happens next. Where do you go next? There is that voice of Marlon Brando’s that reverbs to me. One time, he said (Johnny in Marlon Brando voice) "How many movies do you do a year?" "Two or three". And he said, "You gotta watch yourself". I said, "Why?" He says, "We only have so many faces in our pocket". You get to a certain point when you play all these different characters that he really is right. But one of the luxuries of an actor and one of the joys of the gig is you get to observe people. By observing people, you find little interesting traits and say, "I’ll have a little bit of that". And you just store it up and save it for later because you never know when you’ll need it.

Q: But as you get older and more famous, isn’t it more difficult to make observations because people are observing you all the time?

Johnny DEPP: There’s the rope. That’s one of the occupational hazards. You want to be the observer but when you walk into a room, people are going, "Isn’t that that guy?" There are dangers but there are ways you can still do it from afar.

Q: Going back to Marlon’s comment, you have never returned to a character since "21 Jump Street" so what was it about Captain Jack Sparrow that inspired you to do two more "Pirates" sequels?

Johnny DEPP: Speaking for myself, what happens to me is that with every character, once you’ve clicked into that character, you really know the guy. You become very close to him and love him. It’s always very difficult at the end, that week to 10 days before wrap, where you can hear that clock ticking. Then you go through this really nasty depression afterwards. There’s an odd separation anxiety because you’ve been this person for a pretty good length of time and then suddenly (whistles), gone. For me with Captain Jack, I had a sneaking suspicion that I’d see him again. So when they said they wanted to do "2" and "3" together, I was all for it selfishly just to be the guy again and see him again.

Q: Are there any characters that you were glad to separate yourself from?

Johnny DEPP: Oh yeah, definitely. It’s weird because it’s sometimes more emotional than others. With "Edward Scissorhands", and I feel like a dunce if I didn’t say this but it’s the truth, I remember the last day of "Scissorhands" after 89 days, they did the makeup and I looked into the mirror and thinking, "This is it. This is the last time I’ll see you". It becomes very emotional. It’s a weird, weird thing.

Q: So when it comes to box-office and Hollywood, do you want to continue doing things for your fans or seek projects for yourself and career?

Johnny DEPP: I don’t like to refer to anyone as a "fan". Kids outside the theater - who watch the movies and stuck with me during this long, lengthy, bumpy stretch of road – that’s what means to me the most. They’re the ones who keep me employed. So I kind of look at them as my boss.



2. TORONTO COVERAGE: In Depth with Depp on "Corpse Bride"

Stephanie Sanchez
Source: IESB


In Tim Burton's new movie, Corpse Bride, his favorite leading man Johnny Depp returns to voice Victor, the reluctant groom.
The following is a Q&A from the Toronto Film Festival with Depp about his role in Corpse Bride, Pirates 2 and 3 and life with kids...

Q: Had you wanted to do an animated film and why this one?

Johnny DEPP: It was something I wanted to do, kind of always wanted to do especially since having my first child. I've been watching nothing but animated films now. So I've really developed a respect and love for them. But more than anything, what drew me to this was Tim. We were just commencing Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and he said, ‘Hey, I've got this other thing, Corpse Bride, maybe take a look at it.' So I read it and loved it, but it somehow didn't occur to me that we were going to be doing it at the same time. I thought it was going to be like months down the road so I would have some time later to prepare for the character. So you could imagine my surprise when, as I was very, very focused on Wonka, Tim arrives on set and says, "Hey, you know, maybe tonight we'll go and record some of Corpse Bride". I was like sure, 'course we can. I have no character. I didn't know what the guy was going to sound like or anything. Good fun though.

Q: How did you create the voice?

Johnny DEPP: Well, everything for Corpse Bride happened very quick. It all happened in about 15-20 minutes literally because I had to finish the day as Wonka. And then right after work, Tim and I would go on over to the studio for the session. So the process lasted about the length of the walk from the soundstage to the recording studio which was pretty quick, where I just grilled him. I said, "Okay, where is he from? What do you want him to sound like?" He was born in that little bit of time and I didn't hear him for the first time until he gave me the nod that they were recording. So the preparation for this, I was remiss basically. I should be flogged.

Q: Do your kids think it's cooler that you're a cartoon or a pirate?

Johnny DEPP: I don't know. I'll ask them. The funny thing is with my kids, my daughter's six and my boy is three. My daughter, she's quite calm and ladylike and princessy so she can sit there and watch a movie and not get real antsy. Normally, my boy will watch for about three and a half seconds, then sprint as fast as he can across the room to go and break something. With this film, we watched Corpse Bride together, my boy sat on my lap and watched the entire film, just didn't move, just riveted. Loved it. Which says a lot. It's pretty full, this movie.

Q: Was he scared?

Johnny DEPP: No, he loved it. I mean, there are certainly moments where you get that kind of jolt, but so did I.

Q: How do you bring a Johnny Depp-ness to a character?

Johnny DEPP: I think with any character, it all comes from somewhere in there. It starts from some place of truth within you and then I don't know. It's weird. When I read a script, I get these sorts of images and stuff as we've talked about before, ideas come to me. And then sometimes the images of people come to me, like with Sleepy Hollow I kept seeing a Roddy McDowell/Angela Lansbury kind of thing. So that became the inspiration. Captain Jack, Keith became the inspiration because I started thinking of pirates as rock stars of the time, the idea that their legend arrived months, maybe years before they did. So you just start taking little tidbits of things and storing them up to use later.

Q: Does it come from media for you?

Johnny DEPP: Not necessarily media, but for example, one of the primary responsibilities of an actor is to — and a luxury is the art of observation, being able to watch people and watch their behavior. Which is fascinating because people are really nuts. I've really enjoyed that over the years, just stealing little bits from people, incorporating them into characters.

Q: What was your first reaction when you saw your animated character?

Johnny DEPP: I was very lucky in that I got to meet Victor the puppet just before the session. So just as I was finding out who he might be, I walked into the recording studio and there he was in his glory, and there was the Corpse Bride and everyone, so that was very helpful. The amazing thing is, and people have said it, there is some degree of resemblance. But the funny thing is they came up with those designs a year before.

Q: You were great.

Johnny DEPP: Oh, thanks a lot. And it's such a great — what a great opportunity with this cast. Helena Bonham Carter, Albert Finney, Emily Watson.

Q: Is it more difficult acting without the camera?

Johnny DEPP: I wouldn't say that it's more difficult, but I did go in there thinking, "Yeah, this doesn't seem like it would be so difficult. You've got a piece of paper, you read the thing, a guy records it and then you're done". It's not that at all. It's much more like you're doing scenes with people you've never met and they're not there, and you're reading, your job is to pull these words off the paper, salt and pepper them, just layer them with stuff and then send it out there in a very non-organic environment. So I wouldn't say it's as difficult as filmmaking/moviemaking but it wasn't so easy either.

Q: Describe dynamic with Tim Burton. Do you bring out the best in each other?

Johnny DEPP: I just think he's a genius. And that's not a word that you can throw around very easily. I think Tim is so special, so unique. Our working relationship is, as you can imagine, weird. Because there is a sort of emotional shorthand there. There's this language that even crew guys have come up to me and said, "I just watched you and Tim discussing the scene and had no idea what you were saying. I didn't understand a word". But there is some kind of connection that I don't know how to explain, but most of the time, at least for me, all I'm trying to do is make him laugh. Even in the scene, you can have all these motivations and objectives as an actor and stuff, and then when I get in the ring, it basically all goes out the window and I'm just trying to make Tim laugh. I just want to see in my peripheral vision, I want to see his sort of hunched over giggle where he's trying to not make noise.

Q: Do you think you might be someone's inspiration someday?

Johnny DEPP: That's dangerous territory. I don't know. I don't know that I'm in a position to inspire to inspire anyone but I don't know how to answer that. I honestly don't. I really don't know how to answer it. You got me.

Q: How has your collaboration with Tim evolved? Will you grow old together?

Johnny DEPP: I sure hope so but that's up to you guys because when you see Tim, you have to force him to give me another job. It's funny, the process itself hasn't changed at all since Edward Scissorhands. Even on Scissorhands when we were just getting to know one another and feeling one another out and building that foundation, that all important foundation of trust, it was still the same. He would come in and say this is where I think we should go and this is this and that. But at the same time, what do you think? So I'd add my two cents which would give him another idea and it would mount up into this insanity which somehow there was this trust before we knew that we could trust one another. So the process is exactly the same. It's a very — he includes you in almost every single level of the production. It's pretty amazing.

Q: What's it like making Pirates 2 and making two movies at the same time?

Johnny DEPP: Well, I just discovered that — it occurs to me that Jack Sparrow can be funny. So I'm going to try that this time. I'm just going to try and be funny. No, I don't know. Selfishly, the whole idea of sequels and stuff like that, it's a very odd notion because —

Q: So… more sequels?

Johnny DEPP: I never quite understood the idea of doing sequels and stuff like that until as an actor you think, "I've played this character for months and months and I really got to know the guy, I really got to love the guy". And then the clock starts ticking and you know the end is coming. You go, "Jesus, I'll never see him again. I'll never see him, I'll never feel this again". So you start to get depressed and all that. And with Jack Sparrow, I had the sneaking suspicion that I might see him again. So I'm saying selfishly, I was so excited to come back and do two and three because I just wanted to meet up with him again. I just wanted to be him again.

Q: What's special about him?

Johnny DEPP: I wouldn't say there's anything particularly special about him. It's just that it's someone that I've gotten to know. And you do end up with these weird — it's a very strange situation where as a grown man, you start having separation anxiety with an imaginary character. It's worrisome because you know it's not normal but you can't stop yourself. I just like the guy. He's a pal.

Q: Will you be going back to "Don Quixote"?

Johnny DEPP: Oh, I'd love to. If there's any way to avoid the curse, that would be better.

Q: Have you talked to Terry about it?

Johnny DEPP: Yeah, every time I see him he threatens to. In fact I saw him last night. Yeah, I'd love to do it again. Well, do it again. I'd love to do the film if at all possible. And I stress that if at all possible, because it was going to be good. That was the thing we all felt and was really sad. It was going to be really good. It was like the best of Terry Gilliam. I felt really good about my character. The good news is, if he wants to go back and do that, I know the character so I have less homework to do.

Q: Is it true you weren't able to prepare for Victor? It only took you a few minutes?

Johnny DEPP: I was able, but I didn't. Only because I — well, there's no excuse. I thought we were going to do it later.

Q: How did you read the character, how did you feel about Victor?

Johnny DEPP: Well, he felt like a guy that I knew. When I read it, he felt like — he didn't feel all that dissimilar from other characters that I've played for time. It was just the base emotional feeling. Yeah, along the lines of Scissorhands is what I felt. I didn't know — the funny thing is I didn't expect to get to a point where I as a reader or I as a viewer would step outside of the actor in me and go, "Well, man, he should stay with the corpse bride". I really found myself in that dilemma which helped a lot when we were recording it because I really did, even in reading it, I felt, "Man, I know Victoria Everglot is fantastic and everything and thank God they fell in love, but the Corpse Bride is so magnificent". I mean, have you ever looked at a corpse and thought, "Wow, she's really sexy". She is wildly sexy and beautiful.

Q: What is your view of the afterlife?

Johnny DEPP: It's a complete mystery to me. I think it would be great if you one day just went to sleep and woke up and it was 1920s Paris . That would be excellent. But I don't know, because there could be just dirt and worms. I don't know. I certainly hope so. That's a pretty snazzy place that Tim dreamed up for the land of the dead. I don't know. Is it heaven, is it hell, is it purgatory? Maybe this is the land of the dead. We may not know it.

Q: What is it about 1920s Paris that appeals to you?

Johnny DEPP: It seemed a more innocent, wholesome time. There were possibilities. People were having a ball, feeling sort of liberated. I don't know, it's just a time and a place I've always been attracted to.

Q: How has it changed your life to be a blockbuster star?

Johnny DEPP: I mean, it hasn't changed my — here's an oxymoron for you — work ethic. It hasn't changed my approach to the work. It hasn't changed my outlook to the work. I've been very, very lucky in my life that I have worn many hats, literally. And I'd love to show them all to you. I mean, I've done everything from sold ink pens over the telephone to screen printed T-shirts, worked construction, was a musician for a number of years. I was a busboy. I've done a lot of different things and I've had a great deal of luck in this business. So I'm somewhat together enough to know that if the ride is going smooth and fun and well and everything is peachy keen this week, then all that could evaporate next week and then I'm once again that weird guy that does art films. Which is okay. So I mean, I always said I've never had any allergy to the idea of commercial success. It was just how you got there that was important.

Q: What's after "Pirates 2"?

Johnny DEPP: No idea. Sleep.

Q: What's the story of "Pirates 2"?

Johnny DEPP: I think you'll like it. It's pretty out there.



3. JOHNNY DEPP plays groom to the "Corpse Bride" (answers on the some questions)

Rebecca Murray
http://movies.about.com/od/thecorpsebride/a/corpse091405.htm


Johnny Depp on the Land of the Dead in "Corpse Bride": "Well, Tim explained it really beautifully earlier, and so I'll butcher it but he'll fix it for me. It's the idea that in life there is this kind of constant fear and obsession with death and the mystery of what death is and all of that, to the point of where people are unbelievably tense about arriving there, even though we all know we're going to arrive there at some point. In fact, the land of the living in this thing is sort of super uptight and grey and heavy as a place and going down to the land of the dead where it could be heaven or hell or it could be purgatory, and it's like 1920s Paris. Flappers and craziness. I thought that it was pretty amazing".

Johnny Depp on Working with Tim Burton: Depp said he hopes he’ll get to work with Burton in the future. "It's all up to him whether he gives me the job. Working with Tim, I've said it before, but it's the only analogy that works. Working with Tim is really like going home for me. It's this place that's very comfortable even with the knowledge that there's a lot of risks that have to be taken and you have to really be prepared to explore. But there is great comfort there and there is great safety there".

Johnny Depp and Tim Burton – How the Relationship Functions: "It's always been, with Tim and I, aside from "Scissorhands" which was kind of a general meeting, but after that you get these sort of mysterious phone calls out of nowhere after sometimes months, sometimes years. And he'll say, "What are you doing?" "Nothing. I'm just hanging around". "Can you meet me for dinner next week?" "Sure. Where?" "New York". "Okay". "Okay. I'll see you then". I mean, there's no subject. There's no project. There's nothing. It's just like, "Okay. I'm going to go see Tim in a week". It's always been like that".

Does He Consider Himself Tim Burton’s Muse? "No. For me, I see myself as just a very, very lucky boy who's been drafted to come along for the ride. I would say that the fact that he's chosen me these last times to interpret these characters is either great luck or a huge mistake on his part. No. I think that it's just that we're good friends and we understand each other. We have a similar sense of humor. A similar background. Similar fascinations. So I just feel really lucky. I felt lucky after Scissorhands".

On Playing Characters for Tim Burton that are Reflections of Himself: "Oh, I think that they definitely are to some degree. Reflections of me, too, but certainly the seed starts with Tim. I think that Edward Scissorhands was a character that Tim started drawing when he was a teenager and then that developed over the years, and clearly it's him. I think that there is a lot of Tim in this character. Quite a bit".

Have his children seen any of his recent movies? Depp said, "Well, Jack was real little when "Pirates" came out. He was sort of in the Neanderthal stage. Lily Rose was there and she loved it. It's interesting because they had come on the set of "Pirates" so they were sort of used to seeing poppa as this weird, greasy, pirate guy and then when they knew that I was going to be playing Willy Wonka, they were of course very excited about it because they knew the original film with Gene Wilder. My daughter is pretty familiar with the book, the story. So they came to visit me on the set and, like I said they're pretty used to that sort of thing, but they came to the set and they walked into my trailer and there I was decked out in the top hat and the Prince Valiant hairdo and the cha-cha heels and the eyes and the teeth and the rubber gloves and they just kind of froze and just stared at me for what felt like an eternity, about two minutes. And then they sort of got over it and wanted to try everything on, the top hat and glasses and stuff. I was so scared when they were going to see "Charlie", and way more than the idea of being reviewed by a movie critic. I was so in fear that my kids were going to not react well to the film. So I was sitting at home waiting for them to come back and they arrived back and my son of three years old, Jack, walks in and looks up at me and quoted Wonka. He went, "You're really weird". [Laughs] I felt suddenly liberated".

Johnny Depp on His Agent: "The thing for me that's most touching is that a couple of the people who have been with me have stuck with me since the early days. One being my agent, Tracey Jacobs. She really believed in me. You can hear the violin's starting. But she really believed in me when no one else did. I mean, they wouldn't even look at me and Tracey was always there. I didn't believe in me and she did".

On Keith Richards: Depp hasn’t worked with Richards yet. "It's sort of not totally official yet. It might be. Everyone is trying. He's got a little tour to do".

Johnny Depp Evaluates His Work: Asked if there are any performances that, looking back, now make him cringe, Depp said, "Oh, I cringe at all of them. That's a subject that's so far away from me. I have no idea. I'm not a particularly good judge of my own work because I honestly do my best to avoid seeing the things, and with all due respect to the writers and the filmmakers and the technicians and the artists involved – it has nothing to do with them. I'm really proud of the experience most of the time, but I just can't stand seeing myself up there because you start to second guess yourself. You start to go, "Why didn't I do this? Why didn't I do that? God. Look at my nose. I hate myself". That kind of thing. You just start thinking about yourself and that's where you don't want to be because you were playing a character. So I have a tendency to really just take the experience with me and that's plenty. So I feel like once they wrap me it's none of my business anymore".


Photo from the press-junket on the Toronto Festival, 10.09.2005

Photo from the press-junket on the Toronto Festival, 12.09.2005

The translation in Russian

Ïåðåâîä: Irishka