I didn't really read anything disturbing in Johnny Depp's comments – it sounds like an intent to give an 'out-there' performance. Frankly, that's no surprise, he's built his career on doing that. I'd expect him to do nothing less.
Exactly. And Depp's comments struck me as very similar to a few of the things that Ben Cross had said back in '91 while promoting the Revival:
Cross: "The challenge is to find other facets to the vampire psychology that, perhaps, haven't been portrayed before - or at least not to the, ah, melodramatic or hammy depths I'm taking this particular character to."
Interviewer: "How hammy is that?"
Cross: "Well, it's very near, very near that abyss of tastelessness, you know."
Cross meant absolutely no disrespect with those remarks, nor were there ever the slightest hints in his performance that he was not taking the material or the show itself seriously. In fact, with few exceptions, Cross got some of the best reviews of his career for the Revival. And as anyone who's ever read many of the articles on the Revival will attest, it was DC who not only pushed Cross but all the actors to go to the edge with their performances. The same can be said to be true of DC and the directors of the original DS with regard to its actors. So, if Depp takes his performance to the edge, as he seems to be implying with his remarks in the latest EW piece, he'll simply be following in the tried and true DS tradition.
And yes, Depp did indeed say that his performance in the film will be close to what Frid had done. And I have every expectation that there is a way that Depp's most recent remarks are completely in keeping with his previous ones. We may not know how to reconcile them until we actually see the film. But as I've said before, each of these interviews is a part of the whole as to what the film is intended to be, and none should be taken out and examined separately from the others. They should always be interpreted in light of the whole. Seeming contradictions will surely reconcile themselves eventually...