{"id":574669,"date":"2023-05-16T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-05-16T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/cannes-diary-with-johnny-depp-on-its-opening-night-the-fest-steps-back-into-culture-clash\/"},"modified":"2023-05-16T08:00:00","modified_gmt":"2023-05-16T05:00:00","slug":"cannes-diary-with-johnny-depp-on-its-opening-night-the-fest-steps-back-into-culture-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/cannes-diary-with-johnny-depp-on-its-opening-night-the-fest-steps-back-into-culture-clash\/","title":{"rendered":"#Cannes Diary: With Johnny Depp on Its Opening Night, the Fest Steps Back Into Culture Clash"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n French actress-writer-director Ma\u00efwenn has confessed to a bit of Franco-American culture clash on the set of her latest movie,\u00a0Jeanne du Barry<\/em>. The Cannes opener stars Johnny Depp in his first feature film role in three years, as Louis XV, and Ma\u00efwenn as the 18th century monarch\u2019s favorite mistress. In a recent interview with\u00a0French Premiere<\/em>, the filmmaker said that she had been warned not to knock on Depp\u2019s dressing-room door during filming to let him know she was waiting. \u201cOne day, I did it anyway,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd there, he made me understand that I had committed an unacceptable intrusion and asked me how I would have felt if he came knocking on my dressing room door. I replied that everyone does it all the time. Because that\u2019s how a set works in France!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n That\u2019s how a set works in Hollywood, too, or it should anyway. A door-knock faux pas is downright quaint \u2014 Ma\u00efwenn\u2019s real provocation is her casting of Depp, who is still persona non grata in Hollywood a year after his ugly defamation trial versus ex-wife Amber Heard. And Ma\u00efwenn herself is as complicated a character as her leading man, a #MeToo antagonist currently being sued for assault after spitting at a prominent French journalist. An alleged hitter and an alleged spitter.\u00a0Mon Dieu<\/em>, what\u2019s French for \u201chot mess\u201d?\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n Jeanne du Barry<\/em>\u2019s high-profile spot as Cannes\u2019 opening night film is a virtual case study of the different cultural norms driving the French and American film industries right now. Europe is historically more tolerant of controversial artists than the U.S., at least male ones \u2014 Woody Allen and Roman Polanski continue to make films here. But even Cannes has drawn the line at those filmmakers: Festival director Thierry Fremaux told French news<\/a>paper\u00a0Le Figaro<\/em>\u00a0that he didn\u2019t program Allen\u2019s new Paris-set movie,\u00a0Coup de Chance<\/em>, because \u201cthe controversy would take over against his film, against the other films.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n Depp is another troubled male artist who has so far found a warm embrace across the pond, despite Heard\u2019s allegations of abuse, which he has denied, and two defamation trials that brought the most toxic moments of their marriage into public view. Thanks to a head-scratching verdict in the 2022 U.S. trial that found both Depp and Heard had been defamed but awarded him more money, the takeaway for many casual observers was a vague sense that Depp had won but also that they like him less. According to a poll conducted by Morning Consult, the share of U.S. adults with a \u201cvery\u201d or \u201csomewhat\u201d favorable view of Depp declined by 12 percentage points during the trial, from 68 percent in April 2022 to 56 percent in June after the trial concluded.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n \u00a0For studios in the U.S., the domestic violence allegations and reputational plummet make him uncastable. But for the French producers of\u00a0Jeanne du Barry<\/em>, who are called \u2014 and you cannot make this up \u2014 Why Not Productions, Depp\u2019s unemployable status in Hollywood poses an opportunity. A three-time Oscar nominee with an international fan base, a bad-boy patina and a need to work? Schedule the wig fittings!\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n Jeanne du Barry<\/em>, which lacks U.S. distribution, is not Depp\u2019s only film at Cannes this year, either. He\u2019s also got a directing project in the market, a biopic of Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani with Al Pacino attached. And he just extended his lucrative Dior Sauvage fragrance deal, with the French luxury house touting Depp as \u201cthe soul of Sauvage.\u201d It\u2019s unlikely the 59-year-old star will ever return to the days of fronting family-friendly U.S. studio tentpoles, but this year\u2019s Cannes is his first step in an attempt at a career reboot.<\/p>\n

\n \u00a0Ma\u00efwenn, meanwhile, has her own fascinating story. A former child actor who won the Cannes jury prize for her 2011 drama\u00a0Polisse<\/em>, the 47-year-old French-Algerian filmmaker has been a critic of the #MeToo movement, and her personal history is intertwined with one of France\u2019s key accused. At age 16, Ma\u00efwenn had director Luc Besson\u2019s child, and she has said that their relationship inspired his 1994 film,\u00a0The Professional<\/em>, which starred a then-12-year-old Natalie Portman in a role Portman recently told me she now finds \u201ccringey.\u201d Besson has been accused of sexual abuse by nine women, which he has denied, and the journalist whose investigations helped surface those allegations, Edwy Plenel, says that in February while he was dining at a restaurant in Paris, Ma\u00efwenn grabbed him by the back of his head and spit on him \u2014 an allegation she confirmed during a recent talk show interview.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n Most Hollywood feminists and #MeToo activists aren\u2019t sure what to make of Depp or Ma\u00efwenn, with some declining to comment because they don\u2019t want to malign a female director, and others because they found the Depp-Heard trial uncomfortably ambiguous in its #MeToo takeaways. So far, Cannes has stood by its choice to program a movie mired in off-screen, #MeToo-adjacent controversies. Nearly six years after Hollywood\u2019s gender rights movement kicked off, the black-and-white era of villains and victims is over. And the red carpet of the Palais, at least, is open to those living in the gray space.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n