Johnny Depp Surprises Comic-Con as Scrooge
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- Johnny Depp made a surprise appearance at San Diego Comic-Con on Thursday outside a shop called "Scrooge and Marley" in the Gaslamp district, emerging in full Scrooge regalia—black coat, top hat, and makeup—around 2:30pm after fans had been gathering since noon.
- Depp, in character, bantered with the crowd for nearly half an hour, croaking lines like "Have you no jobs?" and "It seems as though you have so much spare time. I work."
- Depp spent part of the skit ribbing fans who arrived cosplaying as Captain Jack Sparrow from the "Pirates of the Caribbean" films and the Mad Hatter from "Alice in Wonderland."
- Ti West's "Ebenezer" stars Rupert Grint, Andrea Riseborough, Sam Claflin, Daisy Ridley, Arthur Conti, Ellie Bamber, Henry Lloyd-Hughes, Charlie Murphy, Tramell Tillman, and Ian McKellen, opening in theaters November 13.
- Depp called the role "an extraordinary privilege" and told the crowd the Scrooge tale was one he had "been obsessed with since I was a little child."
- Paramount first previewed the film at CinemaCon earlier this year, where Depp also took the stage in Las Vegas to wild applause.
Why it matters: Depp is returning to major-studio theatrical release with a Paramount holiday tentpole after years overshadowed by legal battles and off-screen drama. The aggressive Comic-Con street stunt and repeated wild crowd receptions at both CinemaCon and San Diego suggest genuine audience goodwill for his comeback rather than studio wishful thinking.
