The New Year will start with a swirl of promotional appearances for SWEENEY TODD, and the first on the schedule will be a trip to Japan. Johnny Depp is due to arrive in Tokyo on January 8, 2008, with the Japanese premiere of Tim Burton’s SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET taking place that evening, around 6 pm local time. A press conference will follow on January 9th. Then Johnny and Tim will be off to the UK for the London premiere of SWEENEY TODD, scheduled for January 10th. Whew! That’s one hectic schedule . . . and we will enjoy every frantic minute of it. The Zone thanks GAO and Charlotte Depp for the news from Japan. Good luck to all who are entering contests there, hoping to win a place on the red carpet for the premiere! –Part-Time Poet

Variety has announced the shooting schedule for the upcoming film PUBLIC ENEMIES, written and directed by Michael Mann and starring Johnny Depp as charismatic 1930s bank robber John Dillinger. PUBLIC ENEMIES will shoot in Chicago beginning on March 10, 2008; the film is scheduled to complete principal photography on June 15th, leaving a two-week window before the Screen Actors Guild and Directors Guild contracts expire on June 30, 2008. PUBLIC ENEMIES will be produced by Kevin Misher and Jane Rosenthal for Universal. The Zone thanks Emma for posting the shooting schedule on the News & Views forum.

Michael Mann’s film will be based on the book PUBLIC ENEMIES: AMERICA’S GREATEST CRIME WAVE AND THE BIRTH OF THE FBI, 1933-34 by Bryan Burrough, which focuses on several high-profile bank robbers all operating in the midwest at the same time, including John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, the Barkers, and Bonnie and Clyde. Notes Variety, “In 1933, police jurisdictions ended at state lines, the FBI was in its infancy, the highway system was spreading, fast cars and machine guns were easily available, and a good number of the thirteen million Americans who were out of work blamed the Great Depression on the banks. In short, it was a wonderful time to be a bank robber. On hand to take full advantage was a motley assortment of criminal masterminds, sociopaths, romantics, and cretins, some of whom, with a little help from J. Edgar Hoover, were to become some of the most famous criminals in American history.” Other than Johnny Depp as John Dillinger, no other casting decisions have been announced. –Part-Time Poet