How did it all go so wrong? Why did their love, once as strong as a damp tissue, whittle itself down to nothing. Surely no couple were ever more likely to last forever; a match weaved through a mesh of vanity and bad taste. What’s more concerning is that the press seem to think anyone still gives a tiny shit about the continuing blurry woes that have befallen Johnny ‘way past his best’ Depp and Amber ‘just remind me’ Heard. It makes me ache to think that they should be afforded any public oxygen at all. They could both be as bad as each other, though we all know that regardless of the court outcome that Depp is very likely by far the worse, and together as a couple they weren’t much more than a badly judged tattoo on the bloated arse of celebrity culture.
It seems they have both got some serious issues – with each other and with themselves. Of chief concern for Depp is the fact he has been accused of some serious threatening and violent behaviour as well as generally behaving like a proper twat and a pampered, self-involved little proper twat at that. The tales of his drinking and drugs and general weirdness have done him no favours and all this won’t help a career that has smelt very fishy for quite some time: if you can remember the last time you watched him being good in a film then you have a longer memory than I do. Yes, he’s still working and people are still paying him to, but I have no idea why. He looks waxy and sticky and all those attempts to be a bit Keith Richards have failed again and again because only Keith Richards can do Keith Richards, and that’s the law. That Depp clearly thought he could get there only betrays his colossal, misguided arrogance, an arrogance accumulated from years of actually being very good.
I can’t say I know that much about Amber Heard and that’s chiefly because I have no interest in her whatsoever. A cursory glance at her Wikipedia page tells me that she is 23 years younger than her ex-husband and that alone should ring a bell or two. Her film CV suggests she has enjoyed a few small roles in good films and a few big roles in shit ones, which I imagine goes against whatever vacuous equivalent of a five year plan she had up her sleeve. What is more telling is that I have seen quite a few films with her in but I never realised I was watching her – she is therefore to be judged as an inconsequential polyfiller of an actress. A body hired to fill a space and take up a slice of script. A talent that would seem more suited to The Hallmark Chanel. If you think that’s harsh you may well be right, but it’s also true. She is seemingly famous because she is famous, a famous thoroughly bereft of substance and one that grew disproportionately when she married Depp.
Quite why they should be clogging up the British court system with their petulant back and forth bickering is quite beyond me. I have some sympathy for Heard but it isn’t boundless, and even if Depp wins his case against The Sun people will still think all those bad things happened anyway and it is unlikely he is set to bounce back for the career Indian summer he feels ought to be just round the corner. What were they thinking when they got married? That it would last? Statistics and experience and sheer, raw logic should have amply suggested it would only bring them more misery, and so here they are before us, crammed with bile, and at least one of them, if not both, are telling quite a few lies. If this is the best news we can get to distract us from you-know-what then I’d rather have no news at all.
G B Hewitt. 12.07.2020
On stupidity......and other causes for concern. 