Lily-Rose Depp Ever So Subtly Shades Donald Trump
In a relatively rare interview—with Natalie Portman, no less—the budding actress gets political.
She may be only 18, but in the last few years, Lily-Rose Depp has emerged as an actress high-profile enough to play the sister of Natalie Portman (in the upcoming film Planetarium); become the youngest face ever of Chanel No. 5, as well as a favorite of Karl Lagerfeld’s; and a model successful enough to not only land magazine covers, but enlist a seasoned Oscar winner like Portman to write the accompanying story inside.
The story appears in the latest issue of CR Fashion Book. In the interview with Portman, Depp addresses what you’re probably already thinking: that all that success has of course come so early and so easy because she’s not just any budding teenage actress, but also the daughter of movie stars Vanessa Paradis and Johnny Depp.
“A lot of people think I’m only acting because of my dad, that I have not had to work as hard to be seen or recognized in the industry,” Depp told Portman. “So I think because of that it makes me want to work twice as hard to prove to everyone that I’m not just doing this because it’s easy to do. I’m not just doing it because it runs in the family.”
As a French-American—Paradis was born in the suburbs of Paris, and Johnny Depp in Kentucky—Depp, who says she can both “seem fully French” and be “totally like a Valley girl,” has been able to corner the market in both countries, though it’s definitely clear where her preferences lie: “I like movies that spark your imagination and your curiosity and I find that the kind of depth that French scripts and characters have often leads to that,” she said.
Instant and Infinite, Lily Rose Depp’s Best Looks in 2016
Lily Rose Depp started 2016 off by attending the Yoga Hosers premiere wearing 2016’s favorite effortless bomber trend.
She then effortlessly showed off a colorful look at The Samsung Studio at Sundance Festival 2016 in Park City.
Lily Rose Depp arrives in LAX channeling her inner 90’s kid with low-rise denim and a classic moto-jacket.
Chanel muse, Lily Rose Depp stuns in white.
Glowing on the red carpet, Lily Rose Depp for the premiere of her own movie, ‘La danseuse’
Lily Rose Depp brightly arrives at ‘The Dancer’ at Cannes Film Festival.
Lily Rose Depp in Chanel for at Venice Film Festival.
Depp continues her to wear classic Chanel for the premiere red carpet of ‘Planetarium’
Lily-Rose Depp on the red carpet for 2016’s Toronto International Film Festival
Depp makes her way to Paris at Cinema Gaumont Opera in Paris in a black A-line dress and t-strap heels.
Head-to-toe in Chanel for the celebration of the brand’s N°5 L’Eau in West Hollywood, California.
Lily Rose Depp sits front row at Chanel’s Spring/Summer 2017 show in Paris.
Depp wows in a tailored look for the Paris premiere of ‘Planetarium’
“There’s something more personable in Europe than there is here. In the States, there’s more of a façade that I see people putting on. For me, the French culture is richer,” she continued.
Of course, there’s a reason for that outside of the way the French make films, too: “It’s also easy to prefer Europe given the present state of things,” she said. “I would have been nicer to America a year ago. The way politics is going, it’s hard for me to sit down and point out all the things that I love about America.”
That last year, of course, has seen the country dominated by the election cycle, which prompted Portman, who spoke out against Donald Trump at the Los Angeles edition of the Women’s March earlier this year, to ask Depp if she was able to vote last November. As it turned out, though, Depp, who celebrated her 18th birthday in Tokyo with Chanel just a couple of months ago, “just missed” the cut-off.
“It was really frustrating,” Depp said. “Of course I’m not even seeing the half of it. I’m not feeling the effects that so many other people are feeling. I can’t even imagine actually living it and feeling these changes.”
Her words were definitely not as explicit as, say, her father’s, who earlier this summer joked (and later apologized) about assassinating Trump, but without even saying his name, Depp managed to express her discontent with the president, still achieving a level of shade like a true Frenchwoman.
How Celebrities Protest in the Streets: A Visual History of George Clooney Getting Arrested, Kanye Occupying Wall Street, and More
Emma Watson attended her first-ever march when she made it to the Women’s March on Washington earlier this year—and brought along her mom, who dutifully wore a pussy hat. Though Watson is a United Nations Women Global Goodwill Ambassador and often speaks up about gender inequality, this time around, unlike the other celebs in attendance, she stayed on the streets instead of onstage, opting to yell instead of use a mic.
Muhammad Ali, who was sentenced to five years in prison and had his championship title revoked after he refused to serve in Vietnam, also protested with members of the Black Panther Party in New York in 1970.
In late September of 2001, Brooke Shields, Glenn Close, Bebe Neuwirth and more Broadway stars, some even in costume, rallied in midtown Manhattan to support the New York entertainment industry, when Broadway and the city’s tourism in general took a hit after 9/11.
If you couldn’t tell by the fact that he founded his eponymous nonprofit group dedicated to promoting environmental awareness at age 24, in 1998, Leonardo DiCaprio, who’s also starred in a climate change documentary and even flown commercial to his annual foundation fundraiser, is so dedicated to environmentalism, he recycled a manila folder to use as a sign when he showed up at the Climate Change March in Washington, D.C. earlier this year.
Meanwhile, back in the capital, Jessica Chastain, one of the industry’s most outspoken voices and advocates of women, passed out buttons to the hundreds of thousands gathered at the Women’s March.
Despite the snow, Laura Dern also took part in the Park City Women’s March while at the Sundance Film Festival, regretting not being able to make it to the capital but grinning all the while.
In 2011, Kanye West and Russell Simmons both made it all the way downtown to Zuccotti Park to take a peek at Occupy Wall Street, apparently in support of the movement. “I love how sweet and tolerant he was to the crowd,” Simmons, who in fact made several appearances, later tweeted of West, who unlike Talib Kweli and Neutral Milk Hotel’s Jeff Mangum, refrained from performing. Simmons also spoke up for a silent, stony-faced West at the protest: “Kanye has been a big supporter spiritually for this movement … He wants to give power back to the people. That’s why we’re here.”
Before attending the Women’s March on Washington and marching arm-in-arm with Jesse Jackson, Cher attended another rally in New York a few days earlier, where she called Trump “this unbelievable narcissist” and went off about “those assholes in Washington.” “I tried not to have a potty mouth, but it’s just me, okay? You must never give up, because the thing that will help us, that will get us through this is anger,” she said in a real-life extension of her long stream of all-caps, emoji- and anger-filled tweets.
A Cate Blanchett sighting might be rare in the U.S., but the actress marched along her fellow Australians (and husband) in 2006 in the Walk Against Warming rally.
Madonna didn’t get to do too much marching at the Women’s March on Washington—she kept it mostly backstage, hanging with Gloria Steinem and Amy Schumer—but she did deliver a powerful speech to the hundreds of thousands present. “The revolution starts here,” she told the crowd, after lamenting that “it took this horrific moment of darkness to wake us the f— up.”
Here, in 1971, Jane Fonda was picketing a Safeway in Denver with the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee in protest of the chain’s lack of support for unions, but that was hardly the only time she’s taken to the streets: Starting with supporting the Civil Rights Movement and the Black Panthers in the ’60s, she’s long made a name for herself as a political activist as well as an actress, to the point that she and her husband were at one point monitored by the NSA. Still getting arrested en route from an anti–Vietnam war fundraiser in Canada and infamously earning herself the nickname Hanoi Jane haven’t stopped her: She also showed up at the Women’s March on Washington earlier this year.
George Clooney was arrested—alongside his father, Nick Clooney—during a demonstration outside the Embassy of Sudan in Washington, D.C. at a rally held by Amnesty International and the nonprofit United to End Genocide to call for humanitarian aid for the thousands facing governmental violence and starvation in South Sudan in 2012. After paying his $100 fine to avoid a court appearance, Clooney, who’d recently visited Sudan, then met with President Obama to discuss the crisis.
In 2014, Alicia Keys organized a protest in New York to raise awareness about the more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls that Boko Haram had kidnapped for six months at that point, which her husband Swizz Beatz dutifully attended.
Marlon Brando joined the Congress of Racial Equality to protest an all-white housing area in Torrance, California in 1963, a full decade before he boycotted the Academy Awards and asked Native American activist Sacheen Littlefeather—who asked the crowd for better treatment of Native Americans—to accept the Best Actor award for The Godfather in his place.
Before he made a splash at this year’s March for Science, Bill Nye, aka the Science Guy, showed up in a bowtie to New York’s take on the Global Climate March in 2015 to talk environmental advocacy on the steps of City Hall, as Mayor de Blasio was gearing up to head to the Paris Climate Summit.
Liza Minnelli, Joey Gray, Patti Austin, Lily Tomlin, and Cleve Jones were just some of the celebs to march at the forefront of an AIDS candlelight Memorial March past the White House in 1992.
Rarely afraid of, well, just being Miley, Miley Cyrus showed up to L.A.’s Women’s March in a smiley face-covered unitard, declaring her nonprofit the Happy Hippie Foundation’s support for fellow nonprofit Planned Parenthood while marching alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin.
Woody Harrelson has been arrested multiple times, but the time in 1996 that he scaled the Golden Gate Bridge with members of the group Earth First! to hang a banner in defense of redwood trees was definitely the most scene-stealing.
Last year, after a sniper killed several police officers in Dallas at a protest following police killings of two black men, Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, Snoop Dogg and The Game led a peaceful march to the Los Angeles police headquarters in an effort to promote unity amongst people of color.
Susan Sarandon, Christopher Reeve, Alec Baldwin, and Robert Kennedy Jr. all got together in 1995 in favor of protecting New York City’s watershed before an EPA hearing on the safety of the city’s water.
Shailene Woodley and Rosario Dawson both protested the Dakota Access Pipeline in New York’s Union Square last summer. Woodley ultimately made it out to North Dakota in October, too—and was arrested for criminal trespassing and engaging in a riot. She pleaded guilty—and wrote a personal essay for Time saying she hoped the publicity would spur others into action.
The night before Trump’s inauguration, Cynthia Nixon joined thousands of New Yorkers and plenty more celebs outside Trump Tower to promise her continued attention to causes such as healthcare, climate change, social justice, and immigrant rights throughout the president’s term.
Alicia Keys and __Janelle Monae also made it to the Women’s March on Washington, where both also spoke out and performed. (The latter also invited the mothers of Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner, as well as more murdered at the hands of the police, up onstage.)
Like any good star of an adaptation of George Orwell’s 1984, Olivia Wilde joined Mark Ruffalo and Michael Moore at Trump Tower, a few months after taking care to rid of her Melania-like hair.
Scarlett Johansson joined the scads of celebrities speaking out at the Women’s March on Washington, but chose to focus her speech specifically on Planned Parenthood and women’s healthcare. (Before it was cut short by a sound outage.)
At the Sundance Film Festival during the Women’s March, Charlize Theron still took part in the action in Park City, Utah, carrying a banner and crying while marching alongside other celebs like Laura Dern, John Legend, and Chelsea Handler.
Before showing up to the L.A. Women’s March, too, Jamie Lee Curtis became an early advocate of the #NotMyPresident hashtag, speaking out immediately after the election results.
Back in 1996, Jesse Jackson gave Bruce Springsteen a hug at a rally opposing prop 209, which would end affirmative action based on race and gender in state and local government, in front of the Federal building on Wilshire Blvd. where Springsteen also spoke and performed.
Shortly after Trump’s inauguration, Bella and Gigi Hadid, who are both not only supermodels but proudly Muslim, managed to sneak into New York’s #NoBanNoWall march in response to Trump’s moves to build a wall bordering Mexico, and to place an indefinite ban preventing Muslims from seven foreign countries from entering the U.S.
Over the years, Mark Ruffalo has spoken up—and hit the streets—in support of reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, and the environment, and against fracking, with the latter to the point that he claimed in 2010 to have been placed on a terror advisory list. It’s no surprise, then, that he not only showed up at Occupy Wall Street to speak out against fracking the next year, but also just this week led a protest with Michael Moore against Donald Trump, whom he’s gotten increasingly real about, and in remembrance of Heather Heyer, who was recently murdered by white supremacists.
Rupert Friend on How He Made Out With Johnny Depp In His First Movie Role:
