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>> Check out our exclusive video with Peter Travers about the making of "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" and the on-set chemistry between Keith Richards and Johnny Depp.
>>This is an excerpt from the latest issue of Rolling Stone, on stands until June 1st.
'Come in, it's a beast out there." With those words, Johnny Depp swings open the door to his sleek air-conditioned trailer and offers blessed relief from the brutal California heat wave. Here on the Disney lot in Burbank, where production is under way on Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Depp's trailer -- where reggae and African music are currently blasting -- is his personal oasis from the rigors of three-peating his Oscar-nominated turn as pirate king Jack Sparrow in the alleged final chapter in this box-office treasure chest ($1.7 billion to date). For the past few days, Depp has been graciously sharing the digs with another unimpeachable source of cool. That would be Keith Richards, on a break last September from the Rolling Stones' Bigger Bang tour, to film the small but pivotal role of Jack's far from dear old dad, Captain Teague. It's damn near typecasting, since Depp admits he used Richards as a model for the dreadlocked, mascaraed Jack. As Roger Ebert wrote, "Depp seems to be channeling a drunken drag queen, with his eyeliner and the way he minces ashore and slurs his dialogue ever so insouciantly."
Even with the heat, there's no slurring today. Never mind those stories later circulated by Pirates castmate Bill Nighy that Richards was so soused and wobbly on the set that director Gore Verbinski had to hold Richards' shins steady while he filmed his scenes. At this moment, both Depp and Richards are ready for action, dressed in full pirate regalia for the day's shoot. Richards, who's actually been up and working all morning, appears fantastically torn and tattered, with a bandanna and braids, scars and patches, facial hair and a puffy shirt. The joke is he doesn't look that much different onstage as the lead guitarist for the Rolling Stones.
Depp's trailer is movie-star expansive and well swabbed with couches and wall tapestries, yet the joint also has the scary vibe of a voodoo lounge. After all, Richards, a certified wild card, recently told a Brit magazine that he was so close to his late dad, Bert, that he snorted his ashes with a bit of blow. He said he was kidding, of course, but with Richards you never know. Days earlier, another reporter earned the wrath of Keith for mistaking Richards' famed skull ring for an Iggy Pop copy. The blunder led the rock icon to threaten the journalist with sodomy by banana.
Richards, 63, and Depp, 43, have been casually friendly for a decade. Depp is downright solicitous of his big-screen father, who today has taken to calling him "Johnny, me boy." Depp even offers to fetch cigarettes, making him the highest-paid gofer in Hollywood. "I could use one, yeah," says Richards. "Thanks, mate."
It's clear that Depp, a longtime musician and guitar freak, is having the time of his life during Richards' solo stop on the Disney lot. For all the rock edge that Richards brings with him anywhere, his affection for Depp is clear even when he calls him an "asshole."
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The first question is for you, Keith. Has your career as a rock star all been Method preparation for playing a pirate?
RICHARDS: Actually, you could look at it like that. Both are ways to make a good dishonest living. Pirates are very democratic. Everything's for sale: left leg so much, testicles so much. I mean, they did have a deal going on those boats that was way ahead of the Constitution.
You have some band experience too, Johnny, from your teen years with the Kids. Have you figured out if there are any differences between pirates and rockers? DEPP: I always thought of pirates being the rock stars of the eighteenth century. With both, the myth arrives before them. The word comes around the bend months before they arrive.
Do you remember when you were first aware of the myth of
Keith?
DEPP: Very, very early. Simply found his music. It was always my
first love, even as a small kiddie. I remember when I started
fucking around on a guitar for the first time. Keith -- he goes to
the forefront.
Have you gotten a chance to play
together?
RICHARDS: Not yet.
And how would you compare yourself as a player to the
guitar god over here?
DEPP: I wouldn't even, like, begin.
RICHARDS: Johnny's probably better than he thinks. I'm probably not as good as he thinks.
DEPP: I was almost afraid to meet him for a long time, because there is always a fear that your heroes are going to be shitheads.
RICHARDS: I met him. At first it was like, "Not another one of my fucking son's friends." Johnny started kind of like that and then he worked his way up with me.
How long ago was that?
RICHARDS: I think around '95, in New York. My son Marlon told me,
"You've really got to meet this guy. He is really a fan." And so I
got to know Johnny via that. I knew the name, but I didn't know
really what he had done. I thought he was some guitar player, and
then I thought, "Oh, he's made some movies, too, another one of
those blokes." But then over the years we got to know each other
rather better. Hence I'm wearing this [laughs at himself in
pirate outfit].
Was it hard to convince you to be a part of this
"Pirates" film franchise?
RICHARDS: It was the right place at the right time with the right
guys. And, you know, because he's an asshole.
DEPP: Truth be told.
I think that you, Keith, gave a great acting performance
in the 1987 Chuck Berry documentary "Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll,"
where you played the mature one as the concert producer while Chuck
raised hell.
RICHARDS: It's just me doing what I do in that movie. Hey, Chuck
asked for it, he got it. I am one of the biggest Chuck Berry fans
in the goddamn world. But not when it comes time to work. He's got
a Chuck story as well.
DEPP: I was in this band, the Kids. And we opened up for Chuck Berry in Atlanta. I was seventeen. He arrives. He comes into our dressing room. He thinks we're his band. So I was, like, stupefied. And he handed me his guitar and said, "Tune it up." So I plugged it and used the strobe tuner. He was like, "What the fuck is that?" "A strobe tuner, man." He was mesmerized.
RICHARDS: Yeah, Chuck had never seen a tuner before. He thought you'd be trying to fuck with him. He knows what he wanted to play. Bless his old heart.
Chuck's a great pirate, in his way.
RICHARDS: Oh, yeah, are you kidding me? He used to rape, loot and
pillage all over the place.
Since you both find no difference between pirates and
rock stars, what about between rock stars and actors? The shores
are littered with the bones of rock stars who wanted to
act.
RICHARDS: I can't really dissect that one. Hey, ever since I bashed
me head [falling out of a palm tree in Fiji last year], I've had
these doctors actually projecting themselves to be rock stars. Me,
I'm just a musician. And if the people like my stuff, thank God. It
pushes me on to do more. And I want to do more. That's something
that you don't factor in when you start this game.
Johnny, your Captain Jack Sparrow character has put you
in a new game: movie icon.
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DEPP: It doesn't feel any different than anything I've ever done. It's just that more people saw this movie and liked this character. I was shocked and touched by it.
How do you define Captain Jack's appeal?
DEPP: I think it's pure irreverence, you know, that he's kind of
the trickster.
RICHARDS: He represents potential freedom, to break out of the bounds.
When did Keith figure into your thinking about how to
play this character?
DEPP: You think, "Who's the greatest rock & roll star? Who's
that charismatic and interesting?" And you go, "Oh, fuck, it's
Keith, isn't it? It's Keith."
In your opinion, who does the best Keith imitation? Mick
did a pretty good Keith on Saturday Night
Live."
RICHARDS: Some time ago, yeah. The only other one is the man
sitting right here. There's been loads of wanna-be's. But it's all
posing with a guitar. And not playing right, not looking right, so
not being me. It's amazing so many people would try to emulate me.
Really, it's just in the bones and in the moves. You don't know
what attracts people to what you do.
Growing up, Keith, weren't you a fan of singing cowboy
Roy Rogers?
RICHARDS: Oh, yeah, Roy was great. He could shoot, play the guitar
and ride a great horse. What more do you want?
When did you turn to the dark side and go toward the
pirates?
RICHARDS: That came naturally later. You get an image that is like
a ball and chain. You can clean up your act and become like, "Oh,
how Christian," but still you drag your whole life behind you.
Johnny, didn't you have a negative reaction early on
from studio executives as you started to create the character of
Jack Sparrow?
DEPP: The first month or so on Pirates 1, they all thought
I'd lost my fucking mind.
RICHARDS: No, the opening with you standing on the sinking ship was "I couldn't have done it better meself."
So you have seen the movie, Keith?
RICHARDS: Oh, shit, yeah. How can you not with your grandkids
around? I saw it when Pirates 1 came out. Pirates 2 I did fall
asleep in, but I'd been up for three days.
DEPP:I might have fallen asleep myself.
Keith, did you recognize anything similar right away
between you and the character?
RICHARDS: He gave me a call when he started doing promos for
Pirates 1: "Before you read this shit, I have got to say that I did
base certain parts of my character on you." Well, thanks, Johnny,
for letting me know. Otherwise I would have sued your ass
[laughs].
And when did you get the thought, Johnny, to ask Keith
to be your father onscreen?
DEPP: We had dinner in New York, hanging out, right after Pirates.
I was never sure that he would even go for it.
RICHARDS: I had a week off, Johnny.
DEPP: Time well spent.
RICHARDS: Yeah, the rest of the Stones are kicking their asses back, and I'm a pirate. Just something different to do. I don't know if I can really pull it or not. Either that or it would be one line and out.
How is he doing?
DEPP: Fucking great, man. Two-take Richards.
Frank Sinatra supposedly had the patience for only one
take when he was acting.
RICHARDS: Yeah, but he was a motherfucker.
DEPP: I don't think Sinatra ever stopped to hit his mark. He would walk out of frame -- done.
Johnny, has the huge success of the first two Pirates movies surprised you? DEPP: It surprised the shit out of me, because I'm used to about eighteen people seeing my movies.
And what, if anything, can you tell us about the third movie? RICHARDS: You're looking at it now [points to his costume].
This is as close as you'll ever be, Keith, to being a
Disney character.
RICHARDS: I'm the next Mickey Mouse -- look out.
DEPP: Mickey Mouse with dreads.
Johnny, you never opened for the Stones. Iggy Pop was as
close as you got.
DEPP: Yeah, yeah, when I was a Kid.
Tell me what Stones records connected with you the
most.
DEPP: I was a fan of the early stuff.
RICHARDS: I always hate to pick this one or that one. I mean, as opposed to just, like, rumble away in the background. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what it's about.
DEPP: I've always had a tendency toward Keith's tracks: "Before They Make Me Run," "Little T&A." As a guitar player, he was a god. As he still is. Don't tell him.
Do you on any level consider yourself a failed rock
star?
DEPP: Worse than that, I'm a failed musician. Music was my life,
my first love.
RICHARDS: He's got one of the best guitar collections, very eclectic.
DEPP: There are some nice old L1s.
Keith, haven't you been wearing a skull ring and other
pirate regalia since the "X-pensive Winos" era?
RICHARDS: Since the late Sixties, early Seventies. I have a very
good friend who also makes my handcuffs, but I can't show you
because they are under this goddamn pirate shirt.
Over the years, some of the best quotes have been
attributed to you. One was "I fly under no flag. I'm a musician."
Which to me is the pirate ethos.
RICHARDS: Shit, if I didn't have a guitar, I'd have a boat.
DEPP: I'd do it in a Maserati.
Do you think you have to be a bit of a pirate to survive
in the music business?
RICHARDS: The music business has never been any different. It's a
pool of piranhas. You want to get in there? You better not be
tasty.
>>This is an excerpt from the latest issue of Rolling Stone, on stands until June 1st.
>> Check out our exclusive video with Peter Travers about the making of "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" and the on-set chemistry between Keith Richards and Johnny Depp.