When Bryan Burrough visited Crown Point a few years back, there weren't hundreds of onlookers waiting in the cold and dark for hours just to get a glimpse and maybe a photo as he stepped out of his car.

He managed to walk through the city unheralded and unrecognized as he soaked in details of the old Lake County Criminal Courts building, the jail and sheriff's house.

But the visit by the New Jersey writer would culminate in his 2004 book "Public Enemies," the detail-rich story of the rise of the most lawless era in U.S. history and the subsequent formation of the modern FBI.

(Learn more about Dillinger and the movie, "Public Enemies.")

Which, as astute readers will have guessed by now, became the basis for the film of the same name, directed by Michael Mann and starring Johnny Depp as John Dillinger. It is set for release in spring 2009.

Burrough, 46, a special correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine, has had by his own account optioned "two to three dozen projects" to Hollywood, but up until now has seen only one come to fruition, the Emmy-winning "Barbarians At The Gate," the story of the 1980s takeover of RJR Nabisco made for TV in 1993.

"After that, 'Barbarians' went onto the best-seller list for a week or two, and I got a new refrigerator out of it," he laughed.

Told that local bookstores are sold out, he said, "Tell people to go online and order, none of this library stuff. I'm hoping I can get a new window air conditioner out of this one."

A new version is due out in August -- you know, with the "Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture" banner on it -- and perhaps later another one containing images from the film to coincide with its release.

He'd optioned "Public Enemies," the non-stop action tale of Depression-era gangsters, to Hollywood shortly after its release, then "I'd all but kind of forgotten about it," he said.

Then, in early December of last year, Burrough read in Variety that not only had the option been picked up, it had been "greenlighted" and was going to be directed by Mann and star Depp and Christian Bale.

"I thought someone was playing a joke on me," he said. "I've never had one (option) made into a studio motion picture.

"It's been really funny, I've never had anything quite like this happen before. I really didn't think ahead. It's one thing to have a John Dillinger movie shot, but to have a really quality picture with people like Michael Mann, Johnny Depp, Christian Bale. Wow."

While researching the book, Burrough traveled to every place he would describe, including Crown Point, East Chicago, Warsaw, Auburn, Peru and Greencastle in Indiana as well as numerous places in Chicago and Wisconsin.

"It's kind of a dream. Someone pays you to go to places and research a topic you're already fascinated with. The book was a labor of love. I spent a whole morning walking around the jail -- I couldn't get in -- and the (Crown Point) square. Every physical place I described, I went to.

Told the East Chicago bank Dillinger robbed in January 1934 has been bulldozed and replaced with a drug store, Burrough groaned.

"This whole genre, you've had a lot of crap written about these people. I talked to a lot of the sons and daughters of the good guys and the bad guys, and I had the (newly released) FBI reports and the news reports."

Whatever Burrough writes, it isn't crap. His story unfolds as if Dashiell Hammett had turned to nonfiction writing.

Now, he has been following the unfolding story of the movie shoot.

"I was thrilled with the Crown Point stuff," he said. "You realize, of course, that this can't be 100 percent accurate, but it really does follow the timeline -- the (Michigan City) jailbreak, Crown Point, the (botched FBI) raid on Little Bohemia" lodge in Wisconsin.

"I'm embarrassed to say I didn't have much of a sit-down with actual eyewitnesses, but candidly, there are not that many people left to talk with. There were two or three people who were up in Little Bohemia, and one said she remembered Baby Face Nelson -- it could have been true, but it contradicted everything else I had and as nice and sweet as she was, I just couldn't use her stuff."

Burrough hasn't gone to any of the filming sites "but I've got about 50 to 70 in-law relatives in Chicago, and I think my wife's entire family out there has gone out to some of the shoots," he said.

For a guy who writes for a magazine that in its fledgling years carried prose from Dorothy Parker and T.S. Eliot and Robert Benchley and that today features writers like Christopher Hitchens and Dominick Dunne, Burrough retains an enthusiastic gee-whiz attitude toward the whole enterprise.

"I said before, in my blog, that this must be what it feels like when your daughter gets married. You spend all those years raising her, and then a handsome guy swoops in and she isn't yours any longer, at least not completely."

For more on Burrough's thoughts on the filming of "Public Enemies," please go to http://www.vanityfair.com/ontheweb/blogs/daily/public_enemies/index.html.

The opinions are solely those of the writer. He can be reached at markk@nwitimes.com or (219) 933-4170.