DEPPLY DIPPY

Hollywood boy babes don't come more rock 'n' roll than Johnny Depp. The 31-year-old movie star not only owns the notorious Viper Room nightclub in Los Angeles but has also appeared on Top of the Pops alongside his mate Shane McGowan and played bass guitar in 16 different bands before making it as an actor! These days, despite having vast quantities of rock connections, Johnny's actual music-making has been put on a back burner.

"I could never really go back to music as a profession," he says, just after having completed filming Ed Wood and Don Juan, "so I just play with friends now and again. But somehow I still love music more than anything else."

As a child, he'd play in front of the mirror, practise encores and take bows. And he often needed a costume too.

"Sometimes I'd wear my mom's shirts with French cut sleeves and her bell bottoms," he chuckles. Which brings us neatly to his latest role.

Ed Wood is the true story of the 190s film director, who's been called the worst director in history. His movies like Plan 9 From Outer Space received horrendous reviews and Wood was laughed at and called a weirdo for women's clothes in his spare time.

"I met Ed's widow-Cathy," Johnny recalls. "It was incredible! I was standing there with lipstick smeared all over my face, a tilted wig and she didn't even bat an eyelid! She said I really looked like Eddie. She's a real doll and she helped me out a lot."

Johnny's already played two majorly bonkers characters, Edward Scissorhands and Sam in Benny and Joon, so it's pretty surprising that he decided to add yet another to his list.

"I decided it was a great opportunity to try and clean off the dirt that had been thrown over Ed Wood's name", he says. "To say that someone is the worst director of all time or that his movies are bad is wrong. Ed Wood followed his own artistic vision and remained true to that. Besides, I actually enjoy his movies!"

Is there a little of Ed Wood in you, in that you don't really mind whether your films are good or bad as long as they're different?

"Well I don't want to consciously do anything bad, it's just that so many films, so many characters, have already been done so many times. Most films today are just lots of explosions and young women in bikinis! I'd rather do something a bit different."

'Different' is just the word. Here's Johnny, in Ed Wood, all dolled up in ladies' clothing.

"It's always easier to find the character when you lose more of yourself by putting on different clothes or whatever," he explains, attempting to account for his unusual attire. "Like, for this movie, I also wore some false bottom teeth which changed my whole face and gave me this insane Cheshire cat smile!" But back to the frocks, they're hardly your everyday Hollywood boy babe outfit…

"I actually had no idea what women have to go through until now!" he laughs. "I mean, the skirt, the bra, the lipstick…I mean, I have a much more intense respect for women now!"

What about the angora sweater, a favourite of Ed's, that you wear in the movie?

"Well, I've always loved angora. It feels so good when someone's wearing an angora sweater- you can't take your hands off it. However, I learned that when you're wearing a sweater like this, you can't breathe because of the fur balls. I think I inhaled more fur than air! I'm a little afraid of it now, actually!"

Something Deppo isn't afraid of though is wearing yet another odd cozzie for his next flick. Yep, surprise, surprise, Johnny sports a cape, sword and mask in Don Juan DeMarco and The Centrefold, the story of a bloke who thinks he's Spanish hero Don Juan. He fancies loads of women and eventually gets himself committed to an institution, where he tells his whole amazing story to a psychiatrist played by film biggie Marlon Brando.

Next on the list is a black and white western called Dead Man so, for the moment, Johnny is pretty much booked up. It's surprising in fact that he ever gets to spend any time with his girlf, model Kate Moss. But the pair are often caught out on the razz, at this party or that, and the papers can't get enough of them.

Towards the end of last year, the papers had a field day with a story about JD having a huge barny with Kate and trashing a hotel room in the process.

"What hotel?" he laughs. "Well, I'll tell you what happened. I'm sitting on the couch and this really big daschund dog just jumped out of the closet at me! So I felt it was my duty to retrieve this animal for the hotel. I chased it for a good 20 minutes but it just wouldn't co-operate."

Yeahright, so what really happened?

"Basically, I'm human, just like anybody else and I'm capable of emotion. I can be just as sensitive as anyone else. In my opinion the incident wasn't particularly newsworthy. I didn't think it deserved equal billing to the invasion of Haiti! But saying that, I'm fascinated by the tabloid press. I mean, if Demi Moore gets diarrhoea, I want to read about it. I'm sorry, but I do. If Schwarzenegger gets a boil on his rear end, I want to read about that too. But the idea that someone would be fascinated with the private life of someone like me who tells fibs for a living, that's pretty fascinating in itself, isn't it?!"

Throughout our interview, Johnny toys with his two rings.

"One was a birthday present from Kate," he says, "and the other, which has a skull head on it, is a daily reminder to me that the only thing certain in life is death. It kind of reminds me to keep things on the straight and narrow."

This is all getting a bit morbid, surely life ain't that bad for you at the moment?