With Johnny Depp part of a very public legal battle with ex-wife Amber Heard, Warner Bros. made the controversial decision to replace him as Gellert Grindelwald in Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.
Doctor Strange and Casino Royale star Mads Mikkelsen stepped in to pick up where Depp left off with the threequel, and the response to his take on the villain was a positive one for the most part. However, fans and critics liked little else about the sequel, and the franchise has since been scrapped (leaving the story unresolved and unlikely to ever be concluded).
Depp's dismissal is far from the sole reason The Secrets of Dumbledore grossed only $407.2 million worldwide on a $200 million budget. However, the fact that he was essentially fired after shooting one scene didn't foster much goodwill from those who rallied around the Pirates of the Caribbean star in his war with Heard.
While Depp discussed leaving the project during 2022's Depp v. Heard trial, the actor talked more about being ousted from the Wizarding World in an interview with The Telegraph (via SFFGazette.com).
"Listen, they’ve said all kinds of things out there in the world about me, and it doesn’t bother me. I’m not running for office," he started. "It literally stopped in a millisecond, like, while I was doing the movie. They said we’d like you to resign. But what was really in my head was they wanted me to retire."
Asked what his response to that was at the moment, Depp added, "F*** you. There’s far too many of me to kill. If you think you can hurt me more than I’ve already been hurt you’re gravely mistaken."
Depp played Grindelwald in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. Mikkelsen did a fine job, but the sudden casting change proved jarring.
While Depp has mounted a comeback over the past couple of years, he's yet to star in another big budget mainstream project. As yo can see below, there are still rumblings that Disney wants him back for another Pirates of the Caribbean movie, and that would be a potential game-changer for the actor's standing in Hollywood as he looks to return to the A-List.
"It was very intimidating," Mikkelsen previously said of filling in for the actor. "Obviously, well, now the course has changed - he won the suit, the court [case] - so let’s see if he comes back. He might."
"I’m a big fan of Johnny. I think he’s an amazing actor, I think he did a fantastic job. Having said that, I could not copy it. There’s there was no way I could just copy it, because it’s so much him. It would be creative suicide," he continued. "So, we had to come up with something else, something that was mine, and build a bridge between him and me. So, yes, it was intimidating."
"His fans were very, very sweet, but they were also very stubborn. I didn’t interact too much with them, but I could understand why they had their hearts broken."
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