Johnny Depp is reportedly dropping out of “Black Mass”, a film about gangster Whitey Bulger, after the movie’s producers failed to get the financing they needed and asked him to cut his salary in half.
Depp is used to pulling in about $20 million per picture and told producers he couldn’t do it for less than that after they didn’t get as much as they needed for the budget at Cannes this year. The film will be directed by Barry Levinson if it moves on without Depp.
The star is about to see his pet project, “The Lone Ranger”, released this summer and is currently shooting a sci-fi film called “Transcendence”.
Depp took inspiration from his Lone Ranger character, Tonto, from a painting of a warrior and based his costume and makeup on the image.
“I looked at the face of this warrior and thought: That’s it,” Depp said. “The stripes down the face and across the eyes . . . it seemed to me like you could almost see the separate sections of the individual, if you know what I mean.”
His portrayal of the iconic character might not go over well with some, but Depp says he put a lot of thought into what he could bring to the film. “The Lone Ranger” opens in July.