The Rum Diary director Bruce Robinson has revealed how the "world's number one film star" Johnny Depp persuaded him to return to filmmaking.
In an exclusive interview with Port magazine, Robinson, who is most famous for his 1986 cult classic Withnail and I, described how their creative union came about and how Depp made him give films one last shot.
"Johnny initially got in touch because he liked Withnail... He somehow found me whilst I was on holiday with my family in Spain, and just said 'Do you want to write the movie?' So I said, 'Yes.'"
It sounds like an idyllic scenario, but Robinson was jaded by the film industry and wasn't prepared to direct just anyone: "I'd had the worst creative experience of my life with Paramount pictures 17 years ago, with Jennifer Eight, and I thought, 'If this is film making, then fuck it, I'll just write books.' It was dreadful.
"I didn't want to ever get behind the camera again, I truly didn't. But when Johnny asked if I wanted to direct The Rum I thought: 'This is the world's number one film star and if he's prepared to take a chance, then so am I'. "
The long-awaited big screen version of The Rum Diary, sees Depp return to his gritty roots, playing unhinged journalist Paul Kemp who, irritated by the crushing conventions of late-Eisenhower-era America, answers a small newspaper advert and travels to the pristine island of Puerto Rico to write for a disintegrating newspaper, The San Juan Star.
So, as part of the research process, Robinson was whisked off to Puerto Rico on Depp's private jet, a nice return to filmmaking by anyone's standards.
However, the experience was to be less than smooth: "We were on our way to Los Angeles in his airplane, en route from Puerto Vallarta in Mexico, when the engines cut out. All electrics off. Total fucking silence.
"I saw the San Diego horizon approaching. And perhaps because we'd been drinking a sociable amount of Chateau Haut-Brion, we both just started laughing. I made a remark about how people get into the luggage racks when they're on board a doomed aircraft.
"But suddenly, we're both on our knees crying with laughter. I realised, at that point, plummeting through the evening air, that I really liked this guy."
The Rum Diary is in cinemas 4th November 2011.
Read the full interview in PORT issue 3, out Sept 3rd. www.port-magazine.com
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