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Also read : Tim Burton

A 'gonzo' interview with Johnny Depp, the hero of the Cannes film festival and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Interview & Production : Jacques-Andre Bondy / Premiere

Photos : Michel Haddi / Premiere
Production : Michel Haddi, J.A.B., Production SUMO, Styliste:Delphine Tandonnet, Groomer:Patty York, Location:Quixote Studios

Twenty-seven years ago Hunter S. Thompson left in his convertible to cover a motorcycle race near Las Vegas. Much more interested in characters he meets on the way and in the differences among the drugs he's swallowing with his lawyer, an oddball just like him - as sun lotion this one uses beer - he'll write only three lines about the race.

Thanks to its murderous realism towards 70's American myths and illusions, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream became a literary monument of pop-culture. This 'gonzo' journalism, which throws more light on the personal delirium of its author than on the event itself, upsets the rules and becomes a cult book. Who better than Johnny Depp, Hollywood's rebel, could have incarnated its creator as viewed through the surrealistic and humorous eye of director Terry Gilliam?

Getting this interview with Johnny Depp for Premiere was an unceasing struggle. Not, as you could think, because of the star's "temper" - often wrongfully shown as a I-don't-give-a-damn, willful or restless guy - but because Johnny, who hasn't been on holiday for years, was at last getting ready to set off before going a few days to the Cannes festival and then joining Polanski in Paris to act in his movie.

Monday noon: Here we are! After spending days and days negotiating, hoping, organizing, canceling, reorganizing, all that under an axe provided with turbo, we get informed that HE will finally offer us two hours. Tomorrow, 2:00 p.m.

Tuesday, 1:30 p.m.: I arrive at the studio on Santa Monica Blvd & La Brea. The place isn't unknown to me. Some months before a sudden liking for benevolence had led me here to help a mate who had to audition six dozen models...in one day! I've lost some illusions here, I've learned how you can change from a Tex Avery style excitement (for the first 30) to the deepest boredom of the world (during the following 70) and I discovered that girls are sometimes "compelled" to smile to you. The murderous realism, "the savage journey to the heart of the American dream": I was already in its middle.

Tuesday, 2:30 p.m.: a call: "Sorry, old man", the voice says. "We have to delay. Johnny Depp arrives only at 5 o'clock." He just left for a ride...Michel Haddi, the photographer, shows reassuring: "We'll make it, we'll make it!" No doubt, but we had decided to shoot outdoor, on the studio's roof, where Michel had arranged a surprise for Johnny and at 5 o'clock the light is no more the same. Out of the question securing the interview first and then taking the photographs. We have to shoot as soon as possible. But it needs time! Will it remain enough? Michel promises to be supersonic. We wait again. A long time. It lets us have a look at the heap of clothes the stylist brought. The make-up room is a real store. Fairly a showroom, with lots of jackets, pants and shirts hanging on wheeled wardrobes, in impeccable order. Very pro.

Tuesday, 4:50 p.m.: One of Johnny's publicists (American version of the press agent) lands to reassure us: HE is on the road in his car, HE will not be late. Hollywood publicists are often women, and the bigger their client is the more their panoply - portable, 4x4, Armani suit - looks like cliché. But, it's a man. In jeans. T-shirt. Young. Calm. And, what's more, he dares smoke cigarettes like us in a town where a smoker is a junkie. That's maybe a good sign. Besides he's alone. Stars of Depp's mettle are generally constantly preceded, followed and surrounded by a pack of assistants of various rank whose circus can, according to the circumstances, annoy or amuse. The height of ridicule are those eternal earphones and walkie-talkies with which they communicate to each other without bothering the star. Nothing like that today. Or nothing like that with Johnny? The question is open.

Twenty minutes later a guy, with a loose Rasta cap falling on his head, arrives on his own, discretely, walking quiet, and begins to introduce himself to everyone. It's him! Neither horde nor earphones. You may not be fascinated by the stars, but you are compelled to recognize this boy has got an "aura" much above the average. What strikes first is his features' fineness. You'd say he is 25 - ten years younger than he is - and his glance only makes him look older. You remark his quiet voice too. Quiet, very quiet. He economizes his words. He says nothing unnecessary. Maybe speaking bothers him. But his tone shows it's not so. He chooses, it's only that, no bullshit. He looks human. Suddenly you rather feel like leaving him in peace.

A bicycle's chain coming out from one of his beige jeans' pockets and some motorcycle's grease on his arm let you think maybe he was just doing a repair on one of his motorcycles before he comes. The motorists know how much it gets on your nerves to not take care of an old vehicle. He casts a glance at the clothes they propose to him. The make-up artist sees the grease and begins to take it out. It annoys him a little: "Let it be!" he says.

Then they hand him two big leather jackets, a beige one and a black one. He hesitates, slips on one reluctantly, then he explains his embarrassment: "No, it makes me a bit too… Matthew McConaughey!" We all are in stitches, what turds we are, but we are actually in stitches. He relaxes. With a quite English humor he balances his at first freezing verbal economy with clownery. At last he votes for a black T-shirt. He always votes for a black T-shirt.

We go up to the studio's roof that serves as an outside parking too. A white convertible Mercedes is waiting for him for the photos. It was the surprise. Even if it's clear that Johnny doesn't love being photographed, he follows Michel's instructions very professionally. What bothers him is to take off his glasses. When he does it, with the sun in his face, he opens his eyes one or two seconds, then he closes them ten or twelve. You have to release the camera at the right time.

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