NAIROBI, Kenya – Silver screen heart throb Johnny Depp is missing and feared dead off the cost of Kenya today in the aftermath of a gun battle between the U.S.-flagged Maersk Alabama and Somali Pirates.

The 46-year-old Depp, who this week was awarded People Magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive” accolade for the second time, was aboard the Maersk Alabama in the hopes of gaining “real life” experience working with pirates. Depp is best known for his work portraying androgynous captain Jack Sparrow in Disney’s billion-dollar Pirates of the Caribbean movie series.

“We warned him of the dangers, that these were not like the romantic pirates you see in the movie,” said Paul Rochford, captain of the Maersk Alabama, “but he wouldn’t hear it. He just kept saying they were ‘his people’ and how much he wanted to immerse himself in his role more than ever before.

“He kept talking about something he called the ‘Pirate Code of the Brethren’ and said there was no way another pirate would hurt him. In fact, he said our entire ship would be safe just by his presence on board and even tried to talk us out of being armed.”

Depp - Futility on the Bounty

Hollywood Insiders speculated that Depp may have been under pressure to come up big in his third reprise of the Sparrow role, having accepted a $55 million fee to appear in “On Stranger Tides,” which is the fourth generation of the amusement park tale and had been scheduled for release next summer.

According to Rochford, Depp stayed in character during the entire voyage and insisted on wearing his gaudy 18th-century pirate costume at all times.

“We made contact with Somali pirates about 6:30 a.m. on Wednesday,” said Rochford. “They approached us in a skiff, and Johnny rushed out to the edge of the quarterdeck and kept trying to hail them, even after they opened up on us with automatic weapons fire.

“Johnny just kept yelling stuff like ‘Ahoy, me mateys,’ ‘Go on, take a caulk!’ and ‘Show me your Letters of Marque or I’ll pillage your poopdeck!’

“I’ll never forget the look on his face when they screamed back at him in Arabic, something about Allahu Akbar, and then shot him in the face.”

Rochford described the strike as a “glancing blow” that grazed the star’s famous jawline before impacting his bombastically massive hat. “They were shooting up at us from the water line, so the round bounced off Johnny’s cheek  and then went up and through his hat. It’s all we’ve got left of him, but it’s got a mighty big hole in it.”

According to Rochford, Depp was knocked off balance by the bullet and pirouetted over the side, bellowing “Avast ye, Avast! You’ll not send me to Davey Jones’ loc-” before being engulfed by the waves.

The Maersk Alabama quickly repelled the attack by returning fire and assailing the scrawny Somali brigands with a powerful acoustic weapon.

A subsequent 10-minute search of the area failed to locate Depp.

“It’s kind of sad,” said Rochford. “I think the guy really thought he was a pirate. But we don’t have time to drift around out here looking for him. We’ve got shipments to make and besides, there are more real pirates out here.”

Disney has said it is already conducting a search for Depp’s replacement. It would not provide details about who was on the short list other than to stress that it did not include Richard Grieco despite an active lobbying campaign by his publicist.

Originally posted 2009-11-18 19:47:26. Republished by Blog Post Promoter