Johnny Depp Reveals His True Reaction To Fame When He Was Younger

For most of us, fame is something we covert, but for Johnny Depp, fame was something he wanted to run away from.

Yes, he loves his job as an actor – don’t confuse it – but the fame that came with it was something he wasn’t mentally prepared to deal with. So he made this important decision.

Johnny Depp Says He Wasn’t the Hollywood Heartthrob That Movies Portrayed

The docuseries centering on the life of filmmaker and producer Tim Burton is not only leading us on a journey into his creative mind, but that of his collaborators as well.

Among those that we get to encounter throughout the series are Johnny Depp, Michael Keaton – ‘Batman’ duh – and our very own Bellatrix Lestrange star Helena Bonham Carter.

During his appearance, Depp touched on his early reaction to fame and the sex symbol roles he played back then. This revelation came after an archival footage of Burton showed the director, 66, describing the star, 61, as “very much not” the sex symbol he was portrayed in media.

“I was completely freaked out by [fame],” Depp said in the documentary. “Paparazzi would take pictures of me. People would whisper and point their finger and stuff. I felt like sort of this raw nerve on display.”

For this reason, he pivoted and sought out roles like the ones he played in ‘Edward Scissorhands’ and ‘Ed Wood.’

Speaking of his highly celebrated role in ‘Edward Scissorshands,’ the star remembered beating out the likes of Tom Cruise to land the role. From the first moment he worked with Burton, they had this sort of kinship that carried on to their many future projects together.

“What I noticed the first time we met was he wasn’t saying very many words,” Depp said. “[Burton] would begin a sentence and I would go ‘Oh yeah,’ and then we would talk about Boris Karloff or something. We related on a lot of levels.”

Despite their immediate connection, Depp still wasn’t sure he’d land the role. “After about three-and-a-half hours of a really great yak with the guy, I still thought, ‘No chance, man. No chance,’ “ he recalled thinking.

Johnny Depp On the Unorthodox Way Tim Burton Prepared Him For ‘Edward Scissorshands’

Heading into ‘Edward Scissorshands,’ Depp was nearly scared off by Tim Burton’s approach to developing his character for the screen.

“I was cast in the film but I was stepping into a kind of family that I hadn’t been totally brought into yet,” Depp said. “I was absolutely convinced that I was blowing it. Tim had rehearsed everyone else in the cast. Everyone. Not me. He didn’t rehearse me. He was excluding me from the cast and crew, isolating me.”

“It was scary. I was uber paranoid,” Depp recalled. “Why is [Burton] not rehearsing me? Maybe he trusts me. No he doesn’t. He doesn’t trust you, what are you nuts? He’s going to cast someone else, man.”

Happily for both cast, crew and fans, it was Burton’s way of getting Depp to understand the innate loneliness his character experiences, and not a move to replace him as Depp feared.

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