Here's every major movie role Johnny Depp ed on. Over the course of nearly 40 years, Depp's career has taken some truly unexpected twists and turns. After (in)famously getting his start as one of Freddy Krueger's unfortunate victims during the original A Nightmare on Elm Street, the actor gradually evolved into a teen heartthrob thanks to his performance on the 21 Jump Street TV show in the late 1980s. Even then, there were hints of the less conventional leading man he would become when he teamed up with John Waters for his '50s-set musical comedy Cry-Baby in 1990.
Over the decade that followed, Depp found his niche as an eccentric character actor, while at the same time becoming Tim Burton's muse and, as many would argue, onscreen stand-in. The duo have gone to make eight films together so far, ranging from the Oscar-winning biopic Ed Wood to Disney's billion dollar grossing Alice in Wonderland re-imagining. In that same period, Depp stumbled upon perhaps his most popular role (and certainly the most lucrative one) as Jack Sparrow, beginning with the surprise smash-success of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie in 2003. Thanks to the swashbuckling franchise, Depp's film have grossed more than $10 billion at the box office, and led to him setting a world record for the highest-paid actor in 2012.
In recent years, however, his career has taken on damage. Between starring in a string of costly misfires (The Lone Ranger, Transcendence, Alice Through the Looking Glass) and his personal life overshadowing his work onscreen, Depp is no longer the magnate he was in the '00s. Not helping matters, what was once an inventive way of altering his physical appearance with prosthetics and ultra-pale makeup has now become his shtick, if also one he has seemed to consciously move away from with his most recent films (Fantastic Beasts notwithstanding). Being at a crossroads like he is, now's as good a time as any to look back on the various movies Depp has turned down since he started acting.
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
John Hughes' iconic '80s high school comedy Ferris Bueller's Day Off made a big name out of Matthew Broderick, at a time when the actor had only just gotten his start appearing in the sci-fi film WarGames and fantasy adventure Ladyhawke. Prior to his casting, though, a lot of megastars in the making were considered for the eponymous role, ranging from Tom Cruise to Robert Downey Jr. and Depp. During his appearance on Inside the Actors Studio in 2002, Depp confirmed he'd been in the running to play Ferris, but had to as he was unavailable at the time. The same year Hughes' movie hit theaters in 1986, Depp would instead appear in Oliver Stone's Vietnam War drama and eventual Best Picture Oscar-winner, Platoon.
Backdraft
Rob Howard's dramatic thriller Backdraft has left a smaller cultural footprint than other early '90s hits, and its sequel, simply titled Backdraft 2, went direct to Blu-ray and Digital when it released 28 years later in 2019. Still, it was a success in its time, and served as a key stepping stone in costar William Baldwin's career. The actor stars opposite Kurt Russell in the film as two Chicago firefighter siblings (the well-respected Stephen "Bull" McCaffrey and his not-so-experienced brother Brian) who hunt a serial arsonist setting fires around the city. Depp was reportedly in the running to play Baldwin's role before he turned it down, possibly to go make Edward Scissorhands with Burton (which came out six months before Backdraft). If so, that was a smart move on his part.
Speed
Throughout the different stages of his career, Depp has been many things, but never a proper action movie star. It's possible things could've gone differently, had he signed on to play LAPD SWAT officer Jack Traven in Jan de Bont's hit 1994 action-thriller Speed. The film famously features Keanu Reeves as Jack (pitting him against Dennis Hopper's cop-turned extortionist bomber), but its lead role was reportedly offered to Depp before he ed and Reeves took his place. Interestingly, this isn't the only time Depp and Reeves were under consideration for the same action movie, only for Reeves to sign on. A few years earlier, the actors had also been eyed to play Johnny Utah in the original Point Break (though, it doesn't appear Depp turned the role down so much as it merely went to Reeves instead).
Interview with the Vampire
Author Anne Rice was notoriously unhappy when Tom Cruise was cast as 'The Brat Prince" vampire Lestat de Lioncourt in Neil Jordan's 1994 film adaptation of her Vampire Chronicles novel, Interview with the Vampire. One wonders if she might've been more willing to embrace the movie from the get-go if the role had instead gone to Depp, himself a more obvious fit for the fashionable and vain blood-sucker. (He even has his own rock band, much like Lestat does at one point during Rice's books.) The actor reportedly ed on playing Lestat for unknown reasons, but it all worked out: Interview with the Vampire became a hit and Rice later called Cruise to praise him for his interpretation of Lestat, itting he brought a fervent quality to the murderous character that she couldn't have imagined.
Face/Off
Few movies embody the idea of preposterous '90 action films as well as John Woo's Face/Off, a thriller in which John Travolta's straight-laced FBI agent and Nicolas Cage's outlandish terrorist literally swap faces in their cat and mouse game to defeat the other. Before Woo and Travolta signed on, however, Depp was in the running to play the latter's role, with Marco Brambilla (Demolition Man) directing. In a twist as silly-sounding as the film's premise, Depp ended up ing on the project when he read the script and realized it wasn't about hockey. (Clearly, he had a very different interpretation of what the title Face/Off meant.) Brambilla left some time later, and the movie went on to become the absurd '90s action touchstone that it is.
Titanic
By now, most people know better than to bet against James Cameron whenever he tackles something expensive and ambitious. In the late '90s, though, many fairly thought his historical romance Titanic was a massive bomb in the making, being the first tentpole to cost $200 million to produce. Cameron's hefty script for his three hour-plus epic didn't do much to convince potential stars either; in a 2001 phone interview with Howard Stern, Depp confessed he "labored" through reading the script before giving up and ing on the lead role of Jack Dawson. Instead, his What's Eating Gilbert Grape costar Leonardo DiCaprio signed on to play the character, catapulting him to the upper echelons of Hollywood after Titanic obliterated box office records on its way to winning 11 Oscars, Best Picture included.
The Matrix
Once again, Johnny Depp and Keanu Reeves' careers crossed paths when they were both considered to play Neo in The Matrix. According to The Matrix trilogy composer win the Wachowskis' favor by being "always really tuned in to the concept," as Davis put it, and it's difficult to imagine another actor bringing the perfect mix of zen coolness and charismatic dudeness to the role that Reeves did.
A Series of Unfortunate Events
The bleak humor and kooky nature of Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events universe feels like it was almost tailor-made for Tim Burton's storytelling sensibilities. Indeed, the filmmaker was attached to direct the 2004 movie adaptation of the books early on in its development, with Depp lined up to play the scheming villain Count Olaf. The casting makes sense in that it would've allowed Depp to employ his skills as a master of disguise (or a guy who likes to wear oddball costumes, anyway), though Olaf is a far cry from the outsiders the actor has frequently played in Burton's films. Regardless, he left after Burton departed and was replaced by Jim Carrey, who proceeded to turn his ham-o-meter up to 11 in the role of the murderous, fortune-seeking stage performer.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
Nowadays, Doug Liman's Mr. and Mrs. Smith is more famous for introducing the world to Brangelina than its satirical examination of marriage through a story about two professional killers who unwittingly wed one another. Early on, though, it was Depp and not Brad Pitt who was set to play the Mr. Smith half of the couple in the film. He reportedly turned it down due to the competing number of movies on his plate at the time (including, Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which also opened in 2005), paving the way for Pitt to sign on in his place opposite Angelina Jolie as Mrs. Smith. Depp and Jolie would instead work together five years later on The Tourist, a romantic thriller probably better ed for being Ricky Gervais' punching-bag at the Golden Globes.
Sin City
Robert Rodriguez's 2005 movie adaptation of Frank Miller's Sin City comic books is loaded with recognizable faces in roles both big and small, including Benicio Del Toro as the corrupt detective and abusive boyfriend, Jack "Jackie Boy" Rafferty, in "The Big Fat Kill" segment. This was another case where Depp was in the running to play the role before having to due to his other commitments (again, the mid-'00s were a busy time for him, coming off the success of the first Pirates of the Caribbean film). He was subsequently replaced by his Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas costar Del Toro, and everything more or less worked out for all concerned parties. That being said, one wonders if Depp would've played Jackie Boy's most famous scene (where Clive Owen's Dwight McCarthy hallucinates him coming back to life after his death) quite as deliciously over the top as Del Toro did.
