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Depp making <em>Enemies</em> with Mann
Friday December 07th 2007Johnny Depp is going gangster again.
After two scheduled projects stalled due to the ongoing writers’ strike, the Donnie Brasco alum has been spared the unemployment line thanks to Michael Mann. The Oscar-nominated filmmker has recruited Depp to play one of the baddies in Public Enemies, a Universal drama about Depression-era America’s most notorious criminals and the legendary lawmen who hunted them down.
According to Variety, the 44-year-old Depp and the Miami Vice director met and sealed the deal just hours before the actor’s latest big-screen vehicle, Tim Burton’s adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, had its Hollywood premiere Wednesday.
In Enemies, Depp will play notorious bank heister John Dillinger, whose headline-grabbing exploits made him public enemy number one in the eyes of authorities and a Robin Hood-like figure among the people.
He and his infamous fellow ne’er-do-wells, a rogue’s gallery that included Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly, Ma Barker and Bonnie and Clyde, were part of the great crime wave of the early ’30s. To combat the violent period in U.S. history, the government empowered the FBI, under the stewardship of J. Edgar Hoover, to become a national police force.
Hoover vowed to hunt down his so-called "public enemies" with much success. Dillinger, for instance, died after being gunned down by the feds outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago’s uptown neighborhood of Lincoln Park, where he was coincidentally catching a screening of a gangster movie.
Mann adapted the screenplay to Public Enemies from Bryan Burrough’s 2004 nonfiction book of the same name. The filmmaker and his Forward Pass shingle will coproduce the flick with Kevin Misher and his Misher Films. Tribeca Productions’ Jane Rosenthal will exec produce.
After wrapping Sweeney Todd, Depp was expected to segue into Shantaram for director Mira Nair, followed by The Rum Diary, an adaptation of his late friend Hunter S. Thompson’s debut novel.
But the WGA strike put the kibosh on those plans last month.
Warner Bros. decided to delay shooting on Shantaram to allow more time for rewrites and a reworking of the budget.
Likewise, The Rum Diary was put on ice temporarily while the script awaits tweaking.
And that left the usually busy Depp with lots of free time—and that’s when Mann made his move.
The helmer, whose credits include The Last of the Mohicans, The Insider, Heat, Ali and last year’s feature film version of his hit TV series Miami Vice, had considered reuniting with his Collateral star Tom Cruise for the spy thriller Edwin Salt. But when Depp became available, he and Universal decided to put that on the back burner and fast-track Enemies instead.
Cameras roll on Public Enemies in Chicago in March.
<font size=1>Source: E! Online</font>
Front Page, Industry News
Depp making <em>Enemies</em> with Mann
Friday December 07th 2007Johnny Depp is going gangster again.
After two scheduled projects stalled due to the ongoing writers’ strike, the Donnie Brasco alum has been spared the unemployment line thanks to Michael Mann. The Oscar-nominated filmmker has recruited Depp to play one of the baddies in Public Enemies, a Universal drama about Depression-era America’s most notorious criminals and the legendary lawmen who hunted them down.
According to Variety, the 44-year-old Depp and the Miami Vice director met and sealed the deal just hours before the actor’s latest big-screen vehicle, Tim Burton’s adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, had its Hollywood premiere Wednesday.
In Enemies, Depp will play notorious bank heister John Dillinger, whose headline-grabbing exploits made him public enemy number one in the eyes of authorities and a Robin Hood-like figure among the people.
He and his infamous fellow ne’er-do-wells, a rogue’s gallery that included Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly, Ma Barker and Bonnie and Clyde, were part of the great crime wave of the early ’30s. To combat the violent period in U.S. history, the government empowered the FBI, under the stewardship of J. Edgar Hoover, to become a national police force.
Hoover vowed to hunt down his so-called "public enemies" with much success. Dillinger, for instance, died after being gunned down by the feds outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago’s uptown neighborhood of Lincoln Park, where he was coincidentally catching a screening of a gangster movie.
Mann adapted the screenplay to Public Enemies from Bryan Burrough’s 2004 nonfiction book of the same name. The filmmaker and his Forward Pass shingle will coproduce the flick with Kevin Misher and his Misher Films. Tribeca Productions’ Jane Rosenthal will exec produce.
After wrapping Sweeney Todd, Depp was expected to segue into Shantaram for director Mira Nair, followed by The Rum Diary, an adaptation of his late friend Hunter S. Thompson’s debut novel.
But the WGA strike put the kibosh on those plans last month.
Warner Bros. decided to delay shooting on Shantaram to allow more time for rewrites and a reworking of the budget.
Likewise, The Rum Diary was put on ice temporarily while the script awaits tweaking.
And that left the usually busy Depp with lots of free time—and that’s when Mann made his move.
The helmer, whose credits include The Last of the Mohicans, The Insider, Heat, Ali and last year’s feature film version of his hit TV series Miami Vice, had considered reuniting with his Collateral star Tom Cruise for the spy thriller Edwin Salt. But when Depp became available, he and Universal decided to put that on the back burner and fast-track Enemies instead.
Cameras roll on Public Enemies in Chicago in March.
<font size=1>Source: E! Online</font>
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Front Page, Industry News
Depp making <em>Enemies</em> with Mann
Friday December 07th 2007Johnny Depp is going gangster again.
After two scheduled projects stalled due to the ongoing writers’ strike, the Donnie Brasco alum has been spared the unemployment line thanks to Michael Mann. The Oscar-nominated filmmker has recruited Depp to play one of the baddies in Public Enemies, a Universal drama about Depression-era America’s most notorious criminals and the legendary lawmen who hunted them down.
According to Variety, the 44-year-old Depp and the Miami Vice director met and sealed the deal just hours before the actor’s latest big-screen vehicle, Tim Burton’s adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, had its Hollywood premiere Wednesday.
In Enemies, Depp will play notorious bank heister John Dillinger, whose headline-grabbing exploits made him public enemy number one in the eyes of authorities and a Robin Hood-like figure among the people.
He and his infamous fellow ne’er-do-wells, a rogue’s gallery that included Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly, Ma Barker and Bonnie and Clyde, were part of the great crime wave of the early ’30s. To combat the violent period in U.S. history, the government empowered the FBI, under the stewardship of J. Edgar Hoover, to become a national police force.
Hoover vowed to hunt down his so-called "public enemies" with much success. Dillinger, for instance, died after being gunned down by the feds outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago’s uptown neighborhood of Lincoln Park, where he was coincidentally catching a screening of a gangster movie.
Mann adapted the screenplay to Public Enemies from Bryan Burrough’s 2004 nonfiction book of the same name. The filmmaker and his Forward Pass shingle will coproduce the flick with Kevin Misher and his Misher Films. Tribeca Productions’ Jane Rosenthal will exec produce.
After wrapping Sweeney Todd, Depp was expected to segue into Shantaram for director Mira Nair, followed by The Rum Diary, an adaptation of his late friend Hunter S. Thompson’s debut novel.
But the WGA strike put the kibosh on those plans last month.
Warner Bros. decided to delay shooting on Shantaram to allow more time for rewrites and a reworking of the budget.
Likewise, The Rum Diary was put on ice temporarily while the script awaits tweaking.
And that left the usually busy Depp with lots of free time—and that’s when Mann made his move.
The helmer, whose credits include The Last of the Mohicans, The Insider, Heat, Ali and last year’s feature film version of his hit TV series Miami Vice, had considered reuniting with his Collateral star Tom Cruise for the spy thriller Edwin Salt. But when Depp became available, he and Universal decided to put that on the back burner and fast-track Enemies instead.
Cameras roll on Public Enemies in Chicago in March.
<font size=1>Source: E! Online</font>
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