Citizen Staff/Cory Schaefer
Actor Johhny Depp, who plays John Dillinger in the movie "Public Enemies", drives a car down East James Street in downtown Columbus Monday afternoon as director Michael Mann is in the back seat.
COLUMBUS - The fake snow looked just like real snow, only cleaner.
The movie star looked just like he does on the big screen, only smaller.
And the gawkers? Well, they looked down the wrong street most of the time, but that didn't seem to matter.
Everyone was caught up in the thrill Monday when Hollywood came to small town Wisconsin as the Johnny Depp movie "Public Enemies" started filming in Columbus.
Hundreds of fans stationed themselves on top of snow piles, with cell phones and cameras, ready for a glimpse of someone famous.
Some clearly hoped for more.
Hannah Crawford, a Columbus native and aspiring model/actress who now lives in Madison, stood on South Water Street near the makeup trailer with a sign: "Johnny Depp, come have a drink after the show."
South Water Street was the site of the first Depp sighting of the day.
Hope Menzel, 11, saw him come out of the makeup trailer behind Jodee-O's bar, and enter a black Ford Expedition.
Then, it happened. The rear passenger-side window unrolled, and the hand of Johnny Depp emerged, waving.
"I screamed," she said. And the reaction of the older women along the street? "They're like, 'JOHN-NEE!' " Then the fans started chasing the SUV down the street.
Hope skipped school in Sun Prairie Monday. But perhaps her teachers will forgive her, given her front row seat to the biggest deal to hit Columbus in, like, forever. Her aunt and uncle, Shannon and Brent Huizenga, own one of the historic buildings on Ludington Street, and they were up most of the night in their second-floor apartment watching preparations.
Workers began shooting out fake snow at about 2 a.m., Brent Huizenga said. By dawn, the couple were looking out at a pair of black director's chairs labeled (just like in the movies!) in red with the names Michael Mann and Johnny Depp.
Hope, who could give vintage Hollywood gossip Louella Parsons a run for her money, spent the morning at the front window, snapping photos of actors with a telephoto lens and keeping her mom updated via cellphone.
Even those stuck far from the action enjoyed themselves.
Terri Beck-Engel and daughter Mackenzie Engel, 12, came from Madison to celebrate Mackenzie's first day of spring break.
While Beck-Engel did witness the hand-of-Depp moment, she said it was actually more interesting to watch the activities of the crew. She saw a crew member hustle up the street with a satchel labeled "J.D.'s glasses," and puzzled over whether the initials stood for Johnny Depp or John Dillinger.
But the woman in Columbus with the best shot at meeting Johnny Depp may be 85-year-old Mary Poser, matriarch of the Poser clan of Columbus physicians.
Poser's Craftsman-era mansion on Charles Street will be the location of two key scenes in the movie. On Monday, her oriental rugs were rolled up and the mahogany woodwork was covered with paper to protect it as crews rolled in vintage furniture, including a radio the size of a refrigerator, to help turn her living room into the home of gangster Frank Nitti. A crew member said the script calls for Depp to go to the Poser's leaded-glass front door and the actor playing Nitti will admit him for a meeting.
In another scene, some of the rooms in the Poser home will serve as a brothel where Dillinger goes for an assignation with his girlfriend, a prostitute played by Marion Cotillard, the Academy Award-winning French actress. Poser's back door will serve as the brothel's entrance and the love scene will take place in Poser's front bedroom.
Mary Poser, who raised six children in the home she has lived in since 1952, is a long-time activist for preserving Columbus's historic buildings and is happy the effort is paying off for her town. She's also aware that her home is making a new kind of history.
"People always ask me, 'Does your house have a name?' and now I have one," she said, brightly. "The brothel."