Johnny Depp’s wild years

Johnny Depp had a nomadic childhood, said Robert Chalmers in British GQ. By age 7, he’d already moved dozens of times. “My mom just wouldn’t be—couldn’t be—satisfied in one spot,” says the Kentucky-born actor. His family finally settled in Miramar, Fla., in 1970. But his new home offered few comforts. “[We lived] in a filthy motel,” says Depp, 48. “I used to have to go out and steal coffee and doughnuts.”

At 16, he hit the road and headed to Los Angeles with dreams of becoming a rock musician. He became a movie star instead. But Depp’s critically acclaimed performances were often overshadowed by his off-screen antics. In 1994, he trashed a New York City hotel room, causing $10,000 worth of damage. Then there were the drugs. “We would put things into our body that were unfit to be put into a f---ing automobile,” he says.

Depp renounced his wild ways in 1998, after meeting French singer Vanessa Paradis at a Paris hotel. “I knew at that moment I was done,” he laughs. The couple now has two kids. “Having children woke me up. There was something that it gave me for the very first time in my life: clarity.”

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