How a story about Johnny Depp, cologne and Utah blew up into a controversy

Sometimes a story can change radically in a day.

Take, for example, what happened when Parfums Christian Dior rolled out a new ad campaign for its men’s fragrance, “Sauvage.” The ad stars Johnny Depp, features a lot of Native American cultural references — from Link Wray’s “Rumble” to a Rosebud Sioux dancer — and the red rocks of southern Utah. (It was filmed in Grand and San Juan counties.)

I wrote a story that posted Thursday about the commercial, linking to the video of it and a behind-the-scenes video with Depp and Dior’s Native American advisers. The story quoted some of Dior’s press notes, ad copy so flowery it would make Don Draper envious.

Friday, the story blows up, with commenters on Twitter objecting to the cultural appropriation of Native American iconography — and the fragrance’s name, the French word for “savage,” long used as an insult against Native Americans. I start writing a second story, and while I’m doing that, Dior pulls the ad of YouTube.

One doesn’t wake up in the morning expecting Johnny Depp to take over your life. But here we are.