﻿"When I met Winona, and we fell in love, it was absolutely like nothing before.”
Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder believed their love was forever and could survive anything...
Why did they break up then? Who was against their marriage? Is
it true that Winona never got over Johnny, who was her first love?
Ryder and Depp first met in 1989 at the "Great Balls of Fire" premiere. Their interaction was
brief, but it was enough for the pair to feel a special spark ignite between them. At the time,
Winona was a teen starlet, and Johnny was already a rising TV idol.
They both believed it was love at first sight. Depp described the moment as "a classic glance,
like the zoom lenses in West Side Story, and everything else gets foggy."
The 26-year-old actor was instantly smitten with 17-year-old Winona. A few months later,
they got to know each other a little better after a mutual friend gave them a proper introduction.
Since Ryder was so young, she had never been in a serious relationship before. The actress had
briefly dated Christian Slater for a couple of months, but nothing really came of it.
"When I met Johnny, I was a pure virgin. He changed that. He was
my first everything. My first real kiss. My first real boyfriend. My first fiancé. The
first guy I had sex with." Winona confessed. On the other hand, Depp had his fair share of
experience in the romance department. The actor had already been married to Lori Anne Allison,
whom he divorced in 1985. He had also been engaged twice. The first was allegedly to Sherilyn Fenn,
and the second was with Jennifer Grey. But Winona wasn't phased by his romantic past.
In fact, she knew that what she and Johnny shared was different. Their connection ran far deeper
than anything they had ever experienced before. "We have the same coloring, but we're from very
different backgrounds, so we're interested in each other all the time." She said.
Well, they literally had the same coloring: with their dark hair, pale skin, and brooding good
looks, they matched perfectly well. But what Winona obviously meant was the fact they had
a lot in common. And what did Johnny think when their relationship with Winona just started?
"When I met Winona, and we fell in love, it was absolutely like nothing before.
We hung out the whole day and night, and we've been hanging out ever since. I love her more
than anything in the whole world." He gushed. From the very beginning, Johnny and Winona were
inseparable. In 1990, the actors co-starred in "Edward Scissorhands," and when they weren't
working, they were practically joined at the hip. The couple enjoyed listening to their
favorite music together and reading poetry to one another. It was like their love was a
perfect bubble that they never wanted to burst. Depp even got the tattoo 'Winona Forever' on his
arm to show that wherever he went, she was always by his side. The actress was caught
off guard by his grand romantic gesture and admitted that she didn't believe it was real.
"I sort of was in shock. I kept thinking it was going to wash off or something. I
couldn't believe it was real. I mean, it's a big thing because it's so permanent!"
The permanent ink actually impressed her usually strict parents, and they
quickly came to love and approve of Jonny as a partner for their daughter. Her parents even
used to bring breakfast in bed to the lovebirds whenever they were staying over at their place.
Their relationship was moving fast … maybe even too fast.
After just five months of dating, Depp proposed to Ryder, and they moved in together. The actor
didn't want to waste any time; he got his lawyers to draft all the paperwork and tried to get his
friend, director John Waters, to marry them. The director later revealed in his 2019 memoir,
'Mr. Know-It-All,' that he refused to marry 28-year-old Johnny to 19-year-old Winona because
he thought she was too young. Waters managed to talk them out of the marriage and claimed
that her parents were relieved and grateful that he dissuaded the couple from getting hitched.
Their postponed nuptials was just one of the obstacles that Depp and Rider had to face.
With their respective careers quickly on the rise, their busy schedules also intensified.
Soon, the couple were struggling to make time to see each other outside of work.
By 1993, Johnny was spending days and nights on the set of 'What's Eating Gilbert Grape?'
And it was around this time that the actor began to struggle with substance use.
"It was a pretty dark time for me. I don't know what exactly was going on. Well, I was poisoning
myself beyond belief. I've never seen Gilbert Grape, actually. I can't watch it." He admitted.
The dark cloud that shrouded Depp seemingly took a toll on his relationship with Ryder.
The actress was also diving deep into the character of "a young fiancée with lack of
personal opinion and sense of self" in Martin Scorcese's "Age Of Innocence." With all these
things combined, it's possible that it became too much for the couple to handle all at once.
That same year, Winona and Johnny decided to end their relationship after four years together.
The actress's representative at the time blamed the split on the carelessness of young love and
stardom. Depp, for his part, explained it as follows speaking to Los Angeles Times:
"It's very hard to have a personal life in this town. It was my mistake to be as open as we were,
but I thought if we were honest, it would destroy that curiosity monster. Instead,
it fed it, gave people license to feel they were part of it."
Winona avoided making any public comments about their breakup. She only later said,
"He'll always be in my heart. Forever. Kind of funny that word".
Apparently, she meant it, but the separation turned out to be very traumatic for both.
Ryder found herself slowly spinning out of control. Ten years later, she confessed that
it was the darkest time of her life. "I was embarrassingly dramatic at the time, but you
have to remember I was only 19 years old." Broken engagement put the starlet through the
anguish of depression. A doctor gave the actress sleeping pills, and sometimes she was hell-bent on
taking too many of them. Once Winona fell asleep with a lit cigarette and woke up to the flames.
She also experimented with substances and didn't really care about her career and public image.
In the meantime, Johnny was going through his own personal hell. He started working
on "Ed Wood" with Tim Burton, and, according to Burton, the actor was pretty broken about Winona.
"There were days he would come crying. I asked him why it happened, but all he said was,
'It wasn't her fault; it was mine.' It's almost like Winona took Johnny's soul, Johnny's love."
Burton also mentioned that the actor was never the same, even in his next romance with Kate Moss.
She expected Johnny to get rid of the "Winona Forever" tattoo,
but Johnny changed it to "Wino Forever" instead. After dating Moss for four years, he ended up in a
14-year relationship with Vanessa Paradis. The pair welcomed two children together,
Lily-Rose in 1999 and Jack two years later. Allegedly, Depp began seeing Amber Heard while
he was still with Vanessa. According to an anonymous source, this theory upset Ryder,
whose long-lasting, respectful relationship with Johnny changed after she learned
about his romance with Amber. However, a couple of years later,
Winona rushed to her ex's defense when Heard made accusations against the actor.
"I was absolutely shocked, confused, and upset when I heard the accusations against him. The idea
that he is an incredibly violent person is the farthest thing from the Johnny I knew and loved.
I cannot wrap my head around these accusations." At the time, Ryder claimed she was willing
to be called as a witness for Depp. In an official statement,
she mentioned that she considered him her best friend and someone as close as a family member.
As for Winona's love life, following her breakup with Johnny, she dated Soul Asylum's lead singer
Dave Pirner for two years before they called it quits in 1996. She was then
briefly linked to David Duchovny before her next relationship with Matt Damon in 1997.
Damon soon became her first serious love interest since her split from Depp,
and it seemed that their romance was off to a good start. Winona even accompanied Matt to
the 2000 Golden Globes, where he was nominated for his role in 'The Talented Mr. Ripley.'
Unfortunately, the pair broke up later that year after about three years together.
Despite their split, Ryder had nothing but good things to say about her ex. "Matt couldn't be
a greater, nicer guy," She said, adding, "I'm really lucky that I'm on good terms with him."
Unlike Depp, Ryder never got married or had any children. The actress explained that
she was never a fan of casual dating and described herself as a serial monogamist.
"Marriage? I don't know. I'd rather never have been married than been divorced a few times."
Another reason Winona never made it down the aisle was because of the example of marriage in
her family. The actress's parents were madly in love and married for over four decades.
Their commitment to one another set a high standard for their daughter,
who wouldn't settle for anything less.
In 2016, Ryder revealed she had been dating someone for quite a
while. Though the actress prefers to keep the details of her love life out of the media,
she confirmed that she had been dating fashion designer Scott Mackinlay Hahn since 2011.
While Johnny and Winona's romance is an epic love story, perhaps their love was one that
burned too bright. They were both young, coming to terms with their newfound fame,
and figuring out how to balance their relationship with their busy schedules couldn't have been easy.
It might have all just been too much for their young love to handle.