Jerry Bruckheimer says he’s spoken to Johnny Depp about“ ”returning to “Pirates”: ‘I think he would do it’

Key Points

• Johnny Depp might be open to returning to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise after all, savvy?

• The rum-chasing pirate is part of producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s plans for a sixth film, which would otherwise be a reboot.

• Bruckheimer believes Depp will return if he likes the script, which the producer says is nearing completion.

Johnny Depp is interested in returning to the high seas.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, producer Jerry Bruckheimer reveals that he has had conversations with Depp about reprising his role as Captain Jack Sparrow in a sixth Pirates of the Caribbean film.

Bruckheimer previously told EW that he was eager for Depp to return to the role, despite Disney cutting ties with Depp, which the actor claimed happened as a result of the publication of a 2018 op-ed in which his ex-wife, Amber Heard, wrote that she had been a victim of domestic abuse but did not mention Depp by name.

Now, the producer tells EW that Depp is open to the possibility of reprising his iconic role. “If he likes the way the part’s written, I think he would do it,” Bruckheimer says. “It’s all about what’s on the page, as we all know.”

The last Pirates film was all the way back in 2017 with Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, which Depp was a part of along with other returning cast members Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley. Discussions of a sixth film have been in play since at least 2019.

Bruckheimer has previously clarified that a new Pirates film would be a reboot of the franchise, but that he would still like to see Jack Sparrow make an appearance.

“It’s a reboot, but if it was up to me, he would be in it,” Bruckheimer said previously. “I love him. He’s a good friend. He’s an amazing artist, and he’s a unique look. He created Captain Jack. That was not on the page; that was him doing a little Pepé Le Pew and Keith Richards. That was his interpretation of Jack Sparrow.”

Bruckheimer says it’s still a matter of locking in a script that everyone is happy with. “We are still working on a screenplay,” he says. “We want to make it. We just got to get the right screenplay. We haven’t quite gotten there yet, but we’re close.”

Craig Mazin (The Last of Us) was working with the franchise’s original scribe, Ted Elliot, on the new film. But everything was put on hold during the 2023 dual Hollywood strikes. Bruckheimer said last year that Jeff Nathanson, who wrote Dead Men Tell No Tales, was working on a sixth film.

“I think he’s cracked it,” he said in May 2024 of Nathanson’s script. “He’s got an amazing third act. We just gotta clean up the first and second, and then we’ll get there. But he wrote a great, great third act.”

Still, Depp’s return would reflect a major change on both the part of Disney and the actor himself. Disney cut ties with him in 2018. During the highly publicized defamation trial between Depp and Heard in 2022, the actor said in court that he wouldn’t come back, even if he was offered “$300 million and a million alpacas,” as Heard’s lawyer put it.

“That is true,” Depp responded. “There was a deep and distinct sense of feeling betrayed by the people that I’ve worked hard for. People that I delivered a character to that they initially despised, but I stuck to my guns with the character, and it seemed to work.”

Since 2022, Depp has largely worked on independent projects outside of Hollywood.

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly