It would seem that Johnny Depp is not only in a remake mood, but has also been enjoying working aboard** Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides** with director Rob Marshall. Why so? Because he’s apparently pestering him to work on a new version of The Thin Man for Warner Bros.
Dashiell Hammett wrote the detective novel in 1934, which finds private eye Nick Charles giving up his hard-boiled life to settle down into a world of dedicated alcoholism after marrying wealthy socialite Nora. But his old job comes calling when he’s drawn into investigating a murder, with his wife along for the ride.
While the novel itself never generated a sequel, it became the source material for a series of movies from Warners, with William Powell as Nick and Myrna Loy as Nora. And NBC turned it into a short-lived TV show in the 1950s.
The role of heavy-drinking, easy-quipping Nick sounds like a natural fit for Depp, and while there’s no script in place yet, Vulture reports that the actor is looking to develop it via his Infinitum Nihil production company, and he’s thinking Marshall could be the man to make it.
Interesting trivia point here: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, who recently directed Depp in The Tourist, is on record as saying that one of the big influences on that film as it developed was the Thin Man movies. Sounds like Depp got a little extra inspiration…