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Later this year, Johnny Depp will play the title role in director Ti West’s Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol, yet another adaptation of Charles Dickens’ classic 1843 novel. Depp looks unrecognizable in the first leaked shots from the set, and his costars are already praising his performance, including Harry Potter veteran Rupert Grint (Bob Cratchit). “It’s going great,” Grint told The Hollywood Reporter. “It’s obviously a story that everyone knows, and there’ve been lots of adaptations in the past, and this just feels very different. It feels very faithful, but it has Ti’s signature on it, and Johnny’s amazing. He’s doing some really interesting things.”
Ebenezer packs a lot of major star power: In addition to Depp and Grint, the cast includes Daisy Ridley, Sam Claflin, Tramell Tillman, Andrea Riseborough, and Ian McKellan as Jacob Marley, Ebenezer’s departed business partner. Grint sounds very enthused to be on set with McKellen in particular, saying, “He’s just iconic.”
As for Depp, Ebenezer could be the comeback vehicle he’s been searching for. His career has been stuck in purgatory for years, first thanks to a string of box office failures and then a very public defamation trial against his ex-wife Amber Heard. Depp was fired from the Fantastic Beasts franchise two movies in, with his role — dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald — being played by Mads Mikkelsen in what ended up being the third and final Fantastic Beasts film, The Secrets of Dumbledore. The Fantastic Beasts movies were spun off from Harry Potter, so there’s some kind of serendipity in Depp and Grint now working on a project together.
Rupert Grint Brings Us Another Story About Creepy Babies
Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol will be out later this year. If you’re interested in seeing what else Grint’s been up to recently, his new film Nightborn just premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Directed by Hanna Bergholm, Nightborn is about a married couple who move to a cottage deep in the Finnish forest where wife Saga (Seidi Haarla) spent much of her childhood. They’re elated when they find they have a baby on the way, but their child ends up being odd and different and, well, possibly demonic. This puts strain on their marriage, among other things.
Grint plays husband Jon. To hear him tell it, he mostly wanted to work with Bergholm on account of her incorporating puppets into her films. “I love her use of puppets,” he said. “Whenever I can be on set with a puppet, it’s quite fun… I worked with a few on Potter. They’re something you don’t really see that often in films anymore — [filmmakers] are very quick to [use] CGI, but it’s so nice to have a physical thing.”
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In Nightborn, a puppet is used to stand in for Jon and Saga’s strange child. “It was all practical,” Grint said. “They had a few different versions. They did have an animatronic one, and obviously different stages of it because the baby grows and metamorphoses in various degrees.”
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This is at least the second project Grint has worked on that involves spooky infants; the Apple TV+ show Servant is another. Nightborn doesn’t have a wide release date yet, but will hopefully get picked up soon. As for Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol, it’ll be in theaters on November 13, 2026.
Quiz 5 Questions Test Your Festive Film Knowledge: Depp, Grint, and A Haunting Carol Your Top Score — Attempts — Start Quiz 0 0 Report Error
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Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol Like Follow Followed Fantasy Release Date November 13, 2026 Director Ti West Writers Nathaniel Halpern, Charles Dickens Producers Emma Watts Cast Johnny Depp Ebenezer Scrooge Tramell Tillman Ghost of Christmas Present Andrea Riseborough Ian McKellen
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