Well, Johnny Depp is back. Following two widely publicized trials against his ex-wife Amber Heard that dealt with claims of domestic violence and defamation, it appeared, for a time, that the 62-year-old actor was written off by major studios. However, there’s a cosmic, mathematical formula for semi-cancelled celebrities—something like (x) time away divided by (y) talent level in your field—and the equation decided that 2026 marks the Pirates of the Caribbean star’s return to Hollywood.
Next year, Depp plans to “bah humbug” his way back into Hollywood with a new adaptation of Charles Dickens’s The Christmas Carol. The classic tale follows a miserly old man named Ebenezer Scrooge who discovers the errors of his ways following a visit from the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future.
You could say Depp shares a little something in common with ol’ Scrooge, but the actor didn’t seem interested in the whole comeback narrative when he talked to reporters in 2023. “Everything the majority of you have been reading for the past five or six years regarding my life is fantastically, horrifically written fiction,” he told the LA Times after his French film Jeanne du Barry premiered at Cannes Film Festival to one of the program’s patented seven-minute standing ovations. “I’ve had about 17 comebacks, and I don’t understand it because I didn’t go anywhere,” he continued. “It’s a bizarre mystery.”
Ti West (MaXXXine) is signed on to direct the film for Paramount, titled Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol. According to Deadline, Ian McKellen, Tramell Tillman, and Andrea Riseborough are also cast in undisclosed roles. The film is due out on November 13, 2026—a bit earlier than Christmas.
Depp will also star in an upcoming 2026 action film titled Day Drinker, which is directed by Marc Webb and costars Penélope Cruz. Plus, as Entertainment Weekly reported in August, he’s even in talks with Pirates of the Caribbean producer Jerry Bruckheimer to return for a sixth installment in the franchise. “If he likes the way the part’s written, I think he would do it,” Bruckheimer said. “We want to make it. We just got to get the right screenplay. We haven’t quite gotten there yet, but we’re close.”
So, it seems the curtains will open for Depp next year. But will fans show up for him? His new Christmas Carol adaptation is already up against a tough, direct competitor. Horror director Robert Eggers (Nosferatu) is planning to helm a Christmas Carol film for Warner Bros. starring Willem Dafoe.
To nail the role of Scrooge first, Depp will need to harness what he told the LA Times he does to prepare for any film nowadays—“figure out a way that the viewer can forget who you are and all the baggage you carry in the first three minutes of the film.”
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