Dakota Johnson told me about the time she tore a strip off Johnny Depp, directing a volley of expletives at the poor man that turned the air blue. Luckily for Depp, it was in a film. Johnson was getting ready to shoot a crucial moment in powerful film Black Mass, in which she portrays Lindsey Cyr, common-law wife of brutal South Boston (‘Southie’) gangster James ‘Whitey’ Bulger, played by Depp. Director Scott Cooper knelt beside the 26-year-old actress and talked her through the scene.

She and Depp are in the waiting room of a hospital, where their young son is being treated for a grave illness. ‘He said: “You might be losing your baby. And your partner has turned on you, making it your fault! Just go!”’ she recalled. ‘I unleashed all the profanities I’d ever learned — and some I didn’t know I’d learned,’ she laughed. ‘Bulger comes in and out of her life, but her boy is her life. And I just imagined the rage that would ignite in a woman who was being blamed for her son’s illness.’

 For me, that moment proved that Dakota will not be defined solely by the role of submissive Anastasia Steele, the character she plays (opposite Jamie Dornan) in sex and bondage saga Fifty Shades Of Grey, a big box-office hit earlier in the year. (She will begin filming the second part of the trilogy, Fifty Shades Darker, early next year.)

‘I don’t see myself being defined by anything,’ Johnson insists. ‘I’m constantly learning and ever evolving — I’m full of surprises. And I’ve got a few more tricks up my sleeve.’ One of them is that she will continue to take small but interesting roles, like the one in Black Mass, so she can work with and learn from people like Depp and co-stars Joel Edgerton and Benedict Cumberbatch. Her character in Black Mass is also surprisingly unglamorous.

‘Lindsey was young, but somehow she’s so old, and so weary. I think she gave up everything for Bulger and for their baby. ‘It was pretty common for a woman in Southie to meet a man, have a baby, and give up her job because the father would provide. ‘But I would imagine, if you knew that your husband was involved in organised crime, there would be a part of you that would be wondering if he would ever walk through the door again.’ 

It’s all a world away from Dakota’s own life. Her parents are actors Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson. Her stepfather is Antonio Banderas. And her grandmother is Hitchcock heroine Tippi Hedren — who runs a wildlife sanctuary full of lions and tigers.

‘I was brought up in an environment where I was exposed to things that were exciting and colourful — and sometimes dark and scary,’ she tells me. ‘My family is never dull,’ she adds, drily. Her grandmother keeps lions and tigers in a sanctuary on the West Coast. Dakota loved growing up around those wild beasts, an experience she has found useful. ‘Yes, it’s true that there are big cats in Hollywood to be aware of, too,’ she says, noting that she can take care of herself. If she wants to get away from big beasts and everything else, she’ll visit an art gallery or, if she has more time, take herself off to her mother’s cabin, high on a mountain in Colorado, accompanied by her dog Zeppelin. ‘It’s where I grew up, and where I’m at peace. It’s a place that’s way removed from everything, and I come back into my body then.’ 

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