Johnny Depp will invoke the spirit of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson once again for the adaptation of “The Rum Diary” (this time playing another quasi Thompson stand-in, writer Paul Kemp).
Written in the early 1960s, the novel wasn’t published until 1998; having been rejected numerous times, a then-22-year-old- HST had long given up on the novel until the late 1990s when he resurrected the book, nearly 40 years later.
Depp was set to take the role as far back as 1998 with Benicio Del Toro in the director’s chair, but as Hollywood movies are wont to do, the film began to stall. Because of the delays, Thompson sent an expletive-laced fax to the movie’s producer Holly Sorensen in 2001 lambasting her as a “lazy bitch.” Set to write and direct the film now is “Withnail and I” director Bruce Robinson (who also helmed the very excellent pathological farce, “How To Get Ahead In Advertising.”)
After portraying Thompson as Raoul Duke in Terry Gilliam’s 1998 adaptation of “Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas,” Depp and the writer became fast friends. In 2005 when Thompson committed suicide, Depp was among the tight-knit group of friends that shot the writer out of a canon at his funeral – a celebration that Depp mostly funded. “We had talked a couple of times about his last wishes to be shot out of a cannon of his own design,” Depp told the Associated Press. “All I’m doing is trying to make sure his last wish comes true. just want to send my pal out the way he wants to go out.”
