Celebs Playing Celebs

We all know Johnny Depp loves his outlandish roles -- the sympathetic scissor-handed humanoid, the antisocial chocolatier, the murderous barber, the eye-liner-loving pirate (just to name a few) -- but wouldn’t we all agree, considering his character choices over nearly two decades, that he might be getting just a tad bit, well, predictable? Look, put Edward Scissorhands, Willy Wonka, Sweeney Todd and Jack Sparrow in a lineup, and identifying one from another becomes almost as difficult as distinguishing between La Toya and Janet Jackson.

So what’s a bad boy and three-time Oscar nominee to do if he wants to up the ante and keep us on our toes? He announces that his “dream role” would be to play Carol Channing -- the wide-mouthed, grainy-voiced Broadway and screen legend (most famous for “Hello Dolly”) -- in a story about her life. And how did the now-88-year-old Channing react to Depp’s announcement? She gushed. “I think he is a gifted performer and I would be very proud, as well as interested in seeing what his vision of me would be.”

Depp is no stranger to gender bending (remember his turn as the cross-dressing C-list director in “Ed Wood” and his scene-stealing role as prison tranny Bon-Bon in “Before Night Falls”), and we recognize his partiality to wigs and makeup. But we’re not talking about a guy doing drag here. We ain’t talkin’ “Tootsie” (or “Victor Victoria” or “Mrs. Doubtfire”). We’re talking about an undeniably hyper-talented actor who says he’s open to a role where he has to shift genders completely and capture the persona of one of our most celebrated personalities.

This kind of role isn’t entirely new to Hollywood. As recently as 2007, Cate Blanchett played Bob Dylan in “I’m Not There,” to critical acclaim. Could Johnny and Cate be setting a trend that Hollywood is willing to follow? You can almost imagine the light bulbs going off in the heads of all those studio execs: Who’s next? Jake Gyllenhaal as Cher? Adam Lambert as Liza Minnelli? How about Robert Pattinson as Lauren Bacall, or Sean Penn as Barbara Streisand? Wouldn't Rihanna be great as Prince, and why not Lea DeLaria as Jackie Gleason?