Johnny Depp

Child's Play

UPDATED 12/27/2004 at 01:00 AM EST • Originally published 12/27/2004 at 01:00 AM EST

The key to Johnny Depp's soft twinkling charm? Instant access to that inner child—it's like something he gleefully pulls out of a toy box. "Aye, matey! Look at me—playin' a dirty drunk pirate in Pirates of the Caribbean." Think happy thoughts: "Now I'm playing a grown-up, James M. Barrie, but a wee sort of grown-up." The guy wrote Peter Pan, after all. "And oooh!—now I'm gonna be Willy Wonka." Talk about a kid in a candy factory.