Title: Johnny in Lipton's book "Inside Inside"
FANtasticJD - November 3, 2007 03:30 PM (GMT)
As most of you know, James Lipton, host of Inside the Actors Studio, has written a memoir titled Inside Inside. I love the title. I picked up the book yesterday and transcribed the piece on Johnny. I was disappointed that he mostly quoted parts from the interview which were televised but there were a few new bits. For example, I had never heard that Joe Pistone was present at the taping. Copyright belongs to Mr. Lipton and the parts copied here are for fan enjoyment only. The whole book sounds interesting and I'm looking forward to reading it. Here's the Johnny bit:
| QUOTE |
| The night Johnny Depp came to us, there was rioting in the streets outside out theater, and inside it, people who were neither students nor subscribers to our series were popping out of every aperture but he air-conditioning vents. Today the world acknowledges Johnny’s superstar status: We knew it then. The diversity of our guests has been both a theme of Inside the Actors Studio and a source of fascination for the students and me. One of the many surprises the show has provided is the number of our guests who can make the proud boast that they are to some degree Native American. When my notes indicated that Johnny Depp had Native American ancestry, he said, “My family comes from eastern Kentucky. They’ve been there for many, many generations and my great-grandmother had a lot of Cherokee blood in her.” Thus far in the show’s history, we’ve had six Cherokee feathers in our cap: Johnny, Tommy Lee Jones, Val Kilmer, Kim Basinger, Julia Roberts and Burt Reynolds. The Choctaw Nation can claim two of our guests: Billy Thornton and Teri Hatcher. Cameron Diaz can point to Blackfoot forebears, Angelina Jolie to Iroquois, Ellen Burstyn to Ojibway and Anthony Quinn to the Tamarara Indians of Mexico. Like Sean Penn, Johnny drew cheers from the students by lighting a cigarette- which he rolled himself. And, like Sean, Johnny is known for the scrupulous selectivity with which he chooses his roles. I broached the subject with “You’ve avoided the path that ninety-nine point nine percent of actors yearn for, which is to go the traditional leading-man route. To put it as delicately as I can: You’re so much better looking than I am. You could so easily have taken the leading-man path, and I’m sure you were offered role after role that required a certain male beauty. Have you deliberately taken another path?” “Some people would call it ignorance.” “Nobody in this room.” “I knew being on 21 Jump Street was a very fortunate opportunity and gave me a great education in many ways. But I also was so uncomfortable being a product. I couldn’t stand it. It was claustrophobic. So I swore to myself that I would choose my own path and wouldn’t deviate in any way. And if I failed, I failed, but I tried. And I figured I could always go back to playing guitar or pumping gas.” When I asked about what seemed to be his interest in playing losers and people at risk, he said, “I’m interested, deeply interested, in human behavior and what makes people do what they do, what makes people tick, and why they have these little nervous gesture, which I’m absolutely full of tonight, I’m sure. I don’t know about losers but – people who are considered not normal or outcasts, or not welcomed into society…” “Outsiders?” “People who are not deemed ‘normal’ by society.” “You’ve said, ‘I’m not even born yet. I’m still trying. I’m still pushing. I don’t ever want to get to a place where I feel satisfied.’” “Yeah. I think satisfaction, total and utter satisfaction with your work, feeling that you’ve arrived some place and you’ve won, I think it’s death for an actor.” When I asked Johnny about working with Al Pacino in Donnie Brasco, he said, “In my head I had this idea that he was going to be this really serious, very dark, intense guy who never laughed. And then, we started doing rehearsals, and I discovered that he was certifiably insane. Truly out of his mind and one of the funniest human beings I’ve ever met in my life. But as an actor, oh, my God, just one of the greats, one of the most pure, honest, surprising….He’s a beauty.” In Donnie Brasco, Johnny played the title role of the undercover FBI agent who infiltrated the mob, and when I said, “I want to know, where’d a Kentucky-born and Florida-raised guy acquire that dead-on New York accent” he replied, “Well, I was very fortunate. I spent a lot of time with the real Donnie Brasco, with Joe Pistone. I’m sure he was real sick of me, ‘cause I haunted him. Every day I’d call him, to spend some time. I just tried to get as much of Joe as I possibly could.” Johnny told us that the Mafia had put out a contract on Joe Pistone, that he and his family lived in hiding and that he never went anywhere undisguised. Later that night, Johnny confided in me that “Joe was here tonight.” “You mean here – in our theater?” Johnny smiled. “Sitting with our students?” Johnny nodded. On the way home with Kedakai, I observed (with what she later described as a faint note of pride) that being a master’s degree candidate in the Actors Studio Drama School was more hazardous than we had realized. |
And of course there were a couple photos. Photo credits go to JLS Studio. This first was a tiny one on the back cover of the dust jacket:
and a look at the entire back cover - Johnny's in some good company!
And there was one lovely photo inside the book:
jeppody - November 3, 2007 03:56 PM (GMT)
woohoo Thanks for posting all that Maggie. Crikey, and Joe was in the audience, that is amazing!!
As for that large picture. :thud It's gorgeous!!
:thanks again
Anne x
As for that large picture. :thud It's gorgeous!!
:thanks again
Anne x
BuccaRoux - November 3, 2007 04:23 PM (GMT)
OH thanks for that Maggie! :thumbsup
nurseanne8 - November 3, 2007 05:09 PM (GMT)
I also bought the book and if you are a fan of movies it has lots of great antidotes but the JD bit is by far the best. :) Anne r
herestoyou - November 3, 2007 05:19 PM (GMT)
Maggie--just want to add my thanks for the article AND that drop dead gorgeous photo! I really would love for Johnny to do another sit down with Lipton. His book sounds very interesting.
-Donna
-Donna
Rose Sparrow - November 3, 2007 07:40 PM (GMT)
Well thankfully Joe went undetected by anyone! :ph43r:
I'll have to add this book to my Christmas list, which is getting longer by the hour!
:thanks for posting this FAN!
I'll have to add this book to my Christmas list, which is getting longer by the hour!
:thanks for posting this FAN!
Karen - November 4, 2007 12:49 AM (GMT)
Fan, that was a great read! Thanks to you sharing that bit with me, I know I have to have this book!!! :thanks
Adding it to the every growing list for the book store!
Adding it to the every growing list for the book store!
Theresa - November 4, 2007 03:03 AM (GMT)
That was a wonderful read, and the picture is just gorgeous. :thud
Many thanks for sharing this with us Maggie! :thanks
Many thanks for sharing this with us Maggie! :thanks
Ellen - November 4, 2007 08:02 PM (GMT)
Thank you, Maggie. My favorite interview. And that picture! <heavy sigh>