Johnny Depp Is Shooting A Movie On My Block!

OK, so this isn't directly related to Disney, but it is remotely connected to it via the ever-popular Capt. Jack Sparrow himself, Johnny Depp. Unfortunately, he's shooting a movie produced by Universal Pictures. He's playing John Dillinger in a 1930's Chicago Mobster movie "Public Enemies". (Hum... isn't a scene from James Cagney's "Public Enemy" featured in The Great Movie ride at DHS?).

Right now, they're shooting right next to where I live in the Lakeview neighborhood, Chicago. In fact, they created a shanty town right next to my building in the grassy area (well, it WAS covered with grass till now) underneath the CTA elevated train tracks. They started in earnest yesterday, and will shoot through tonight. All the scenes are being shot at night.

What is more interesting, however, is how they've converted a large portion of the block to look like Chicago in the 1930's. They have laid down a cover on the street to make it look like it is made of cobble stones. They replace the street lamps with old-fashion, gas-lamp lookalike, and they've put several vintage cars on the street. They are also having old train cars to run on one of the train tracks on the elevated tracks. No wonder these movies cost an arm and a leg!

Anyway, here are some pictures that we took of them setting up the shoot. Some are taken at dusk last night, while others were taken today after most of the crew have left (they were busy from sundown last night till around 6:00 am this morning).

This is the shanty town they erected right next to my building.




This was taken from my front porch of the crew getting ready yesterday for their first evening of shoot. There were A LOT of people!


More crew members getting ready. This building is diagonally across from where I live. Supposedly, they've taken over the unit on the second floor (and put up the occupants in a hotel over the duration of the shoot). They've redecorated the apartment to look like a 1930's unit, so I'm guessing they're shooting some of the scenes from inside the place, and probably overlooking the street and the shanty town outside. The mail courier was the one who got to see the place and told us about it.


But again, the most impressive part was what they did to the street and using the vintage cars to make it look like a Chicago scene from the early part of the 1900's. The cobbled-stone surface actually looks very nice! I wonder if we can convince the Mayor to do that for our street? :)


Notice the street lamp that they've replaced right behind the car.





Alas, they're shooting the movie only at night (late at night). So I didn't get a chance to see if I can get a sneak peak at Mr. Depp.

Zz.