Gawker: defamer, pirates of the caribbean

Johnny Depp's Threat Not to Make Pirates 4 Collapses on Day 10

Brian Moylan — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 13:21:21 EDT

Johnny Depp made a big deal about making known his dissatisfaction after his friend Dick Cook was ousted from Disney last week. Apparently he's already forgotten about that.

After hearing the news of Cook's departure on September 18, Depp said that his participation in the fourth film, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides—which is tentatively scheduled for 2011 and will make more booty for the studio than J.Lo has when she's retaining water weight—hinged on the quality of the script and his passion for the project. ""There's a fissure, a crack in my enthusiasm at the moment. [The franchise] was all born in [Dick Cook's] office," he told the L.A. Times, hinting that he would not return now that Cook was gone.

Well, Depp is already back walking the plank. A spokesperson from Disney said that Captain Jack Sparrow will not be recast for the movie.

So, guess that goes to show you just how long taking a stand lasts in Hollywood: ten days, give or take. But you have to cut them a break here. I mean, we're all for taking stands, but not expecting a man not to make a fourth Pirates movie — we can't all be Mohandas Gandhi!

Breaking: Hollywood Still Out of New Ideas

Brian Moylan — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 10:20:56 EDT

Word out of Comic-Con is that the movie biz is spending their precious resources on Pirates of the Caribbean 4, Batman 3, Wanted 2 (sans Angelina Jolie), and The Strangers 2. Suddenly, K-Pax sequel has fingers crossed for greenlight. [Popwrap]

Is Captain Jack Sparrow Plundering Disney For $54 Mil?

Seth — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 17:15:40 EDT

In Johnny Depp, Disney found an unlikely Mickey messiah. His once-dicey-seeming turn as a scenery-chewing eyeliner junkie was a risk worth taking, it turned out, and it wasn't long before Pirates of the Caribbean's staggering grosses had execs' eyeballs rolling back into their heads, replaced by spinning gold bullion. Resisting the urge to stuff their single biggest revenue generator into a chest and throw away the key until Depp had completed filming on Pirates 4 through 18, the company instead lay out a buffet of properties and encouraged the actor to help himself—and he did, committing to parts like the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland; The Lone Ranger's sidekick Tonto; and, in his biggest stretch to date, the titular transportation device of Jerry Bruckheimer's thrilling Monorail: The Motion Picture. Still, we haven't yet seen the last of Captain Jack Sparrow, a role Depp is reportedly revisiting for a $56 million paycheck. From the Daily Mail:

Hollywood heartthrob Johnny Depp will pick up a staggering $56 million for starring in a fourth Pirates Of The Caribbean film. And it's the highest up-front pay-cheque in showbiz history.

Insiders claim the movie will have Captain Jack searching for the elixir of eternal youth. But it's unlikely that Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley will return to their roles.

If the amount reported by the British tabloid is right, the sum would make Depp the highest paid movie star in Hollywood history. Yes, it's exorbitant, but we have no doubt the malleable thespian will earn every cent, giving audiences $56 million dollars' worth of boozy swashbuckling and sexually ambiguous repartee with his tentacle-faced love interest in the hotly anticipated Pirates of The Caribbean: Song of the Peg-Legged Parrot.

A swashbuckling good deal! Johnny Depp to be paid £32m to star in fourth Pirates Of The Caribbean film [Daily Mail]

First Look! Disney Mule Johnny Depp Reviving Tonto For New, 'Lone Ranger'-Starved Generation

STV — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 12:15:00 EDT

With infidel Mickey Mouse still in hiding after last week's death-sentence fatwa, Disney appears to be rolling the dice on a bold rebranding of sorts. Behold — Disney Depp (née Johnny), whose anchoring of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise yielded yesterday's news of not only Pirates 4, but also the star's attachment as Tim Burton's Mad Hatter in a live-action Alice in Wonderland and as Tonto in a revival of The Lone Ranger. The announcement was made Wednesday in Disney's marathon State of the Mouse Biennial, putting its jittery investors at ease, its fans in an uproar and the press into some kind of overwhelmed coma. Johhny Depp? As Tonto? In Josh Groban's incredulous words, "Really?!"

Yes, really:

A daylong preview of upcoming Disney movies and projects, held Wednesday at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland, ended with a surprise appearance by the actor, outfitted as Jack Sparrow, walking onstage to the tune of "The William Tell Overture," the Lone Ranger theme.

The Depp castings were just a couple of the developments that Disney execs, led by chairman Dick Cook, offered up to a packed house of exhibitors and media types. In lieu of doing major presentations at industry confabs like ShoWest, Disney traditionally throws elaborate show-and-tells in Los Angeles every few years to promote its wares.

Those wares include competition for Depp as the default Mouse Heir: Another report places Nicolas Cage in an updated Sorcrer's Apprentice, set in present-day New York and featuring Cage as the Sorcerer. We have 10 bucks on Miley Cyrus as the title character. Seriously, Mickey, nut up and come back anytime — all is forgiven.

Johnny Depp in deep with Disney [THR]

Why Keira Knightley’s Newest Rival Will Never Be ‘The Next’ Pout-y Princess

Molly Friedman — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 19:50:00 EDT

The Brits are always fond of reminding us of just how many stars they’ve discovered, sent our way, and watched dominate the last decade’s Best Actress Oscar pool. And Keira Knightley is certainly one of their most notable success stories. But as much as they love gushing over their own born-and-bred A-listers, whenever a newer, younger little Brit with potential comes along, they love yanking that shiny crown off the last pout-y superstar and placing it atop the unknown’s pretty-ish head. Which leads us to 16-year-old Georgia "The Next Kiera Knightley" Groome, the upcoming star of the irresistibly-titled Angus, Thongs, And Full-Frontal Snogging, hailed by The Daily Mail as Bridget Jones for teenagers. But after reading more about the film and its quirky dialogue (imagine a script co-written by Diablo Cody and Anthony Burgess), not to mention its leading lady’s disturbing ignorance on all things Johnny Depp-related, we came up with three reasons why Georgia will have a hard time filling Keira’s impossibly narrow shoes:

1. The Script Makes Bend It Like Beckham Sound Like Shakespeare: Diablo may have been able to get away with now-sticky phrases like "Honest to blog" and "Phuket, Thailand!" thanks to the plucky work of Ellen Page. But take a gander of these cringe-worthy attempts to make the next "fetch" happen from Angus: "'Oh my giddygodspyjamas" (what she exclaims when she sees a boy she likes), "nunga-nunga holder" (bra) and "Vulgaria!" (the biggest put down). Call us nuts, but we find it hard to get on board with a star whose "As if>!"-esque breakthrough quote-worthy line includes any of the above.

2. Georgia Has No Cokepants Escapades Or Nudity Scandals In Her Future: As she tells the Mail, "I don't think I could handle all that fame and attention...Basically, I like living with my mum and dad, I like living at home, I like school and I'd miss all my friends.'" Oh dear. We're not sure an actress can even get her passport stamped on this side of the pond spouting that kind of saccharine wholesomeness. At least Keira busts out an F-bomb or twelve in nearly every interview she's given.

3. Anyone Who Dares To Neglect Johnny Depp's Pre-Pirates Career Is On Our Shit List: And we don't care how young they are. On the topic of Depp, Georgia gets all gooey-eyed and 'fesses to a crush (permissible), but goes on to say she didn't know who he was before she saw his Keith Richards impersonation in the swashbuckling blockbusters. In our world, that kind of talk is pure sacrilege, even for a 16-year-old.

MEET MIDGET JONES! GEORGIA'S BEING HAILED BY HOLLYWOOD AS THE NEXT KEIRA KNIGHTLEY [Daily Mail]

Why Does Keira Knightley Always Look So Sad?

Molly Friedman — Mon, 05 May 2008 20:35:00 EDT

Most stars have their own trademark pose on the red carpet. Think Renee Zellweger with her pursed lips looking like she just took a shot of lemon juice, or Lindsay Lohan's classic blowing kiss move. As for Keira Knightley, with her wildly perfect facial features and oddly appealing underbite, she's patented "The Pout." As she puts it:

"I was pouty when I was 16 or 17 and it's sort of stuck...It's when I'm nervous and my neck gets really really tense and then that pressure sort of squeezes up to my lips and they push out and there you go, that's the pout."

Though, if nerves are to blame for Keira's moody look on red carpets, why pout her way through movie roles as well? We examine the Knightley Pout from both past and present, on and off-screen, after the jump.

On nearly every red carpet, Keira refuses to reveal a single chomper, instead opting for the "pushed out lip" look she blames on nerves and tension. Understandably, flashbulbs and shouting fans would make us nervous, but after four years of major fame, wouldn't waltzing down the red carpet be a lesson learned way back in Fame 101?

And yes, her pout reappears in role after role. In each of the three Pirates flicks, that frown never leaves her face. And sure, fighting dead pirates and keeping your cool while filming scenes with the impossibly dreamy Johnny Depp would make us nervous too, but surely she could mix in the occasional smile. Can't her agent find her a good old-fashioned, Love, Actually type rom-com next? Or, at the very least, slip her a Valium or two before her upcoming red carpet appearances?

[Photo credits: Getty, IMDB, Wireimage]

KEIRA KNIGHTLEY BLAMES NERVES FOR HER POUT [Starpulse]

'Pirates' Sets Records, Sort Of, Even Though Records Are Silly And Who's Counting Anyway?

Seth — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:12:02 EDT

As you settle back into your ergonomic seats after a well-deserved long weekend, contemplating how a Tuesday morning could feel more hopeless than any Monday ever did, consider stirring some box office numbers into your coffee instead of that heaping teaspoon of rat poison. You'll thank us if you do.

1. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End—$115 million

Per God and Disney's projections, audiences gobbled up the final installment to summer 2007's Trilogy of Substandard Threequels to Movie Franchises That Have Long Since Squandered Their Creative Capital, netting Captain Jack Sparrow and the gang a (Four-Day) Memorial Weekend box office record to call their own. Even so, Buena Vista VP Chris LeRoy doesn't "like to put too much emphasis on what the opening weekend means," particularly because this opening weekend means his movie was outperformed by Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, and even its own predecessor, Dead Man's Chest. Still, interest in the adventures of an eyeliner-addicted pirate still grappling with his sexuality well into middle-age appears to be showing no signs of waning, and so a fourth installment, Pirates of the Caribbean: Ghosts of Jack Sparrow's Pre-Sellout Career, could very well sail into cineplexes by summer 2008.

2. Shrek the Third—$69 million

The dream is ogre: A steep, 43 percent decline in business doesn't bode well for the green monster with the bastardized Canadian brogue. Poor word of mouth could be to blame, but one mustn't discount the influence of this widely run McDonald's commercial, which helpfully reminded audiences just how annoying the Shrek world is.

3. Spider-Man 3—$18 million

Spidey and friends crawl past the $300 mil domestic mark, but the movie is a runaway hit with foreign audiences (Asians have Tophermania!), putting its total gross at just over $800 mil. No movie was ever more deserving.

4. Bug—$3.3 million

If they had just added "-Man" to the title, Lionsgate could have increased their take ten fold.

5. Waitress—$3 million

We're all for the pie-therapy espoused by Adrienne Shelly's final film. Nothing makes the pain go away like sinking one's face into a freshly baked crust, effectively blotting out the world's troubles with the smells, sounds, and textures of still-warm strawberry-rhubarb filling.

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE May 25-27, 2007 [Box Office Mojo]

Rosie Abandons Her Post, Never To Be Heard From Again

Seth — Fri, 25 May 2007 15:29:41 EDT

· Rosie and her Sharpie-wielding heavies pack it in early. You all hurt her feelings! You should be ashamed of yourselves!
· In honor of Pirates' opening, Fandango imagines some other blockbusters based on Disney rides. We don't really have the heart to tell them that Jungle Cruise is already happening, or that Vinnie Chase is likely going to be the one to star in Matterhorn, after he refuses to bang Prince Yair's wife to get Medellin made.
· New York's Saks Fifth Ave. shoe department has just been granted its own zip code (yes, you read that correctly). We can't let those East Coast philistines outdo us: Let's make Barney's accessories department its own sovereign nation state!
· Blogging.la is having a "worst job in Los Angeles" contest. Scott Rudin's first assistant? Brett Ratner's Toejam Removal Coordinator? Are you guys even paying attention?
· Remember that whole chained-to-the-stairs, swinging-firepokers and fired-shots insanity at the O'Neal's place? Ryan's off the hook.

Fox Hoping To Simulate Quality Entertainment

Seth — Fri, 25 May 2007 13:55:33 EDT

· Sandra Bullock will star in The Proposal, a romcom about a "demanding female boss" who winds up in a sham marriage to her "young male assistant" in order to avoid deportation to Canada. Hopefully this won't put any bright ideas into the heads of nebbish agents who hired their call-rollers based on their fuckability alone. [Variety]
· Fox has bought the rights to The SIMS videogame series, which they feel has great potential for "traditional story telling," something the simulated gay cowboy love story Brokeback SIMS Mountain has already poignantly proven.
· Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is on a course for a box office bounty as bloated and incomprehensible as the movie itself. [Variety]
· Despite producers having taken out a full-page ad trumpeting Nicolas Cage would play young(er) Al Capone in The Untouchables' prequel, "scheduling conflicts" won't allow the actor to participate. They can take great comfort in knowing that not only have they dodged a massive bullet, but that white-hot breakout Spartan Gerard Butler is on board, taking over for Sean Connery in the role of Jimmy "That's the Chicago Way" Malone. [Variety]
· TV Networks scan the 2006-2007 ratings data, then promptly crap their pants. [THR]

Orlando Bloom Hoping To Grow Out Of Elf And Pirate Roles, Perhaps Play Dancing Cat On London Stage

Seth — Mon, 21 May 2007 22:49:39 EDT

With Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End poised to be the next in a wave of mammoth movie installments currently toppling box office records, star Orlando Bloom—who, having played Gwyneth-haired Elf warrior Legolas in the LOTR trilogy, is no stranger to the grueling schedule of back-to-back adventure trilogy shoots—admits to the MTV Movies Blog of having the kind of career fatigue that plagues only a handful of actors. That is, having one's fill of starring roles in gigantic-budgeted movies that approximately half the world's population will see:

MTV: You keep saying things like "I've loved working with [Johnny Depp]." Is this the end of the line for you? What is the future of the "Pirates" franchise?
Bloom: I'm looking forward to "Pirates 10" because I'm gonna come out with a walker, and Johnny's gonna be wheeling himself out in a wheelchair. [He laughs.]

MTV: Seriously, though, Johnny has said he'd do more. Would you?
Bloom: Honestly, it's been a really great, fun ride. I'm looking forward to doing some theater in London at the end of this.

While At World's End might indeed mark Bloom's last swing of the scimitar, we wonder how long he'll be able to tread the West End boards before he begins to long to return to the creative womb of the seafaring trilogy. Sure, the dialogue may not be Chekhov or Stoppard—Bloom even admitted to EW recently that "the writers can't even explain the third movie"—but explosion for explosion, 8-figure paycheck for 8-figure paycheck, nothing quite fulfills an actor's shallow need to validate their bankability like starring in a Jerry Bruckheimer production.

Bonus Link: Merry trailer-mashing pranksters Black20 are back again with their take on Captain Jack Sparrow's latest adventures, co-starring Sloth, Rizzo the Rat, and Richard Grieco.

Orlando Bloom Says He's All Done With 'Pirates,' 'Lord Of The Rings' [MTV News]

Superman Returns To Contribute To Childhood Obesity

Seth — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 17:55:09 EDT

So that you wouldn't have to, Wired.com's Lore Sj berg sampled this summer's crop of breakfast cereal movie tie-ins, those boxed, promotional confections aimed at ensuring that the public is either breathing, eating, or excreting the studio's summer blockbusters at all times. Some of his findings:

Pirates of the Caribbean The cereal bits are shaped like "pearls," which is to say Cocoa Puffs, and the box doesn't explain what the marshmallows are supposed to be beyond "pirate-shaped."
Cars
I find it troubling that it's cereal hawked by cartoon beings that don't even eat cereal. That would be like Snap, Crackle and Pop selling motor oil. Which I guess would make them the Pep Boys.

Ice Age 2: The Meltdown "Frosted multi-grain ice cube-shaped cereal with acorn-shaped marshmallows." I'm not certain what the difference is between "cube-shaped" and "ice cube-shaped..."
Superman Crunch
It's good to see Superman and Cap'n Crunch — the two most powerful beings in the universe — collaborating.

The fact that Superman Crunch turns your milk blue is a nice touch, as is its other, unadvertised feature: after several bowls, it also turns teeth a bright Kryptonite green that's appropriately effective at neutralizing their natural, cavity-fighting defenses. Still, the intended consumers of these products are a fickle bunch, and the youngsters will have long forgotten those gimmicky pleasures by the time they've moved onto the deadly, sugar-coated surprises awaiting them in Snakes in a Cereal Box.

Sweet New Silver-Screen Cereals [Wired.com via BoingBoing]

Defamer Connections: 'Pirates' Pants-Plunderer Seeks Quickie Treasure

Seth — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 17:05:46 EDT

Impressive CGI sequences and box office shattering numbers aside, we at Defamer realize some of this summer's major releases may leave audiences feeling a little underserved. All the more credit, then, to an anonymous Craigslist patron who seeks to enhance his Pirates of the Caribbean viewing experience, but doesn't need expensive bells and whistles like 3-D IMAX sequences to do so:

ANYONE GOING TO VISTA THEATER TO SEE PIRATES? LOOKING TO PLAY W/ A GUY W/ A NICE BIG THICK COCK, WATCH YOU RUBBING N STROKING HOPEFULLY IF ITS NOT TO BUSY MAYBE SNEAK IN TO THE BATHROOM FOR A QUICKIE GIVE YOU A HOT BLOW JOB OR WE CAN HOOK UP AFTER MOVIE. IM 33 LATIN MASCULINE MAN 5'7,165,32W,HAZEL GRN EYES MUSTACHE N GOTEE LOOKING TO PLAY AND SUCK A GUY W/A HOT CLEAN COCK. IM STD N DRUG CLEAN U BE TOO. PLEASE REPLY W/YOUR FULL DESCRIPTION N PIC

Should our treasure seeker fail to find an adequately peg-legged matey, however, he can always focus on the on-screen character of Davy Jones, whose writhing, tentacled face should amply provide the hyperphallic visual stimulus he seems to crave.

"PIRATES OF TH CARRIBEAN" @VISTA theater today @2:45pm -anyone going? - 33 [Craigslist]

That Thing On The 'Pirates' Billboard Explained

Seth — Fri, 30 Jun 2006 18:59:41 EDT

Yesterday, we threw a question open to you, our far wiser and more cultured readership, as to what the hell was going on with an altered Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest billboard we'd passed several times on Sunset. Someone had stuck an image of a face we've seen wheatpasted around town many times before (whom we always assumed was Jakob Dylan, for some reason), though the heights and scale of this particular stunt finally got us to wonder what it all meant. Many of you pointed us to the answer—it's the work of a street artist named Seizer-One, and the face is his own. Thanks, guys—we'll sleep much better knowing Bob Iger now has the correct information on where to send his stormtroopers in order to deliver some Mickey Mouse-brand street justice to the guy vandalizing their promotional real estate.

[Photo: LAist]

Seizerone.com