The role Johnny Depp thought he’d be fired from: “I was convinced”
Johnny Depp has always been someone just as famous for his off-screen antics as anything he’s done in film. A hard-drinking, drug-taking, troublemaker, Depp has always been something of a bad boy. He was a divisive figure even long before his infamous legal issues with his ex-wife, Amber Heard. However, for every detractor, there is someone who will defend him to the hilt as a talented and charismatic performer.
The triple Oscar nominee is no stranger to losing out on jobs because of his private life. He was famously cut from the ‘Fantastic Beasts’ franchise, in which he had been starring as villainous wizard Gellert Grindlewald. Mads Mikkelsen took over the part, a process he described as ‘chaotic’. Earlier in his career, Depp thought he’d lost another gig, albeit under very different circumstances.
In an interview with Charlie Rose on his namesake talk show, Depp told a story about the early days of making Tim Burton’s oddball classic Edward Scissorhands. “We were living in this sort of resort, some kind of country club thing, and there was a knock on the door,” he recalled. “One afternoon, while everyone was off rehearsing. There were two young girls at the door, and I thought, ‘Oh, they found me, and maybe they want me to sign something’, I don’t know. So, I opened the door and said, ‘How do you do?; and they said, ‘Hi. Is Tom Hanks here? Does he live here?’ I said, ‘What? No. Not yet.’ And I was convinced that Hanks would be replacing me. I was convinced. It was one of the most frightening moments in my career.”
Depp’s anxiety wasn’t entirely unfounded. Hanks was one of the many actors considered for the part, but the Forrest Gump star opted to star in Bonfire of the Vanities instead. That film turned out to be an absolute catastrophe, which had to make Depp feel pretty good about himself. Other names attached to the project included Tom Cruise, Robert Downey Jr., and, bizarrely, Michael Jackson. I would pay an obscene amount of money to see that version of the film.
In the end, Edward Scissorhands and Depp turned out to be perfect for each other. The young star was an ideal vessel for the troubled science experiment, allowing him to flex his muscles as a character actor drawn to unusual roles. The film was a big financial success at the time and has continued to resonate with future generations several decades after its release. Crucially, it marked the first collaboration between Depp and Burton, one of the most famous actor-director duos of all time.
Hanks is more than capable of playing a range of roles, but it’s almost impossible to imagine him as the spiky-handed protagonist. He lacks the innate weirdness to pull something like this off; something Depp has in spades. Amazingly, these two icons have never appeared in a movie together. Maybe there’s still some residual resentment there.
Up to this point, Depp was mainly known for his role in the TV show 21 Jump Street, as well as small movie roles in Platoon and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Edward Scissorhands turned him into a star and set him on course to become the household name he is today. Thankfully, those women knocking on his door had got the wrong address.
