Tough tongue twister

[bobquasit]

I was walking past the TV displays at Best Buy just now, and I saw Johnny Depp playing Willy Wonka - they're pushing the DVD heavily right now.

He was making an odd face, and suddenly a thought crossed my mind:

"He's channelling Carol Channing."

And that's it. "Channelling Carol Channing". Try saying THAT three times fast.

Comments

[klyfix.livejournal.com]

Is channeling Carol Channing better than channeling Michael Jackson?

[bobquasit.livejournal.com]

It's a lot funnier and less creepy, anyway.

[moonlitmagik.livejournal.com]

i love j. depp but how he looks in that movie scares me..

[bobquasit.livejournal.com]

I know! I think he's one of the most talented actors around. And he's picked some GREAT scripts. But for this one movie, well, he's creepy. And he's never done this before, but this time I noticed elements from other other characters he's played. There's definitely a fair amount of his Ed Wood in his Willy Wonka.

Which sounds like a bad commercial parody, now that I think of it.

"Hey! You got your Ed Wood in my Willy Wonka!"

"Well, you got your Willy Wonka in my Ed Wood!"

Two great characters that do not go well together.

I also just noticed that both names sound rather phallic. What an odd coincidence. Or maybe it's just my dirty mind. :D

[moonlitmagik.livejournal.com]

haha

[klyfix.livejournal.com]

Okay, you realize that after that I had to Google "Willy Wonka Ed Wood Slash." :)

Didn't find any actual Ed Wood/Willy Wonka stories, although there do seem to be a surprising (scary?) number of slash and explicit fanfics about characters Johnny Depp has played. And found a goofy thing with Daleks.

[unquietsoul5.livejournal.com]

Depp does a lot of mixing and matching other actors performance bits into his work, it's one of the reasons why he's good - he's a chameleon of sorts.

Ex: Benny & Joon, where he is obviously playing Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp, combined with what I think is Stanley (Of Ollie & Stanley) to produce an even more 'lovable pathetic character'.

Ex: 9th Gate. Corso is at least in part based on young Jack Nicholson (not his voice, but the body langauge), I'm not sure of the other part of the character, but I'm not an expert on these things.

I'm still trying to figure out his version of Jack Sparrow... the body language appears to be unique, but the vocal intonations I know I've heard before as well as the facial posses. Maybe part John Waters (I haven't seen enough footage of him to know).

The thing is that there are actors and celebrities who are, really, icons and at this point archetypes in people's minds for certain character portrayals, so if you mix a couple of them together there is a subconscious connection with the character being played that makes perfect sense and makes the performance work better in people's minds. It's that which I see Depp doing in his films.

[bobquasit.livejournal.com]

I think Jack Sparrow is based at least partly on Dudley Moore's Arthur character. Although Depp claims he's based on Keith Richards, if I recall correctly.

The thing that impresses me most about Depp is his chameleon ability. That's not an absolute requirement for acting greatness, but it's definitely a huge help. My favorite actor, Alex Guiness, had it in spades, of course.

[unquietsoul5.livejournal.com]

True, Depp has real acting ability not like many current actors. It's one of the things that drives me crazy is how little real talent many of these actors have, they're just playing slightly exaggerated versions of themselves in many cases, and not really getting in to character.

Ex:Harrison Ford.... every single character he's ever played comes across identically in tone, voice, body langauge, facial expressions, range of emotions (all 3 of them), and general theme.

Granted there are mant actors in the past who had the same feel in all their parts, like Jimmy Stewart, but that should be the exception not the constant in the industry.