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The long-awaited 21 Jump Street movie finally hits the big screen this weekend, and we're flashing back to Johnny's first-ever ET interview as the hot star of the original 21 Jump Street.

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Back in '88,  the 24-year-old Johnny was just getting used to mobs of screaming fans calling his name, and found the concept "very exciting, [but] it's also a little strange. … It's very new to me."

The hard-working star had a work ethic towards his fans that he's kept to this day: "I try to sign as many things as I can. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings or make them feel like I don't have time to do it."

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Johnny also described how pal Nicolas Cage introduced him to his agent and landed his first role ever, in A Nightmare on Elm Street: "I moved to Los Angeles in 1983 with a band I was playing with – I used to play guitar in a band called The Kids – and I met Nic through this friend of mine and he thought I should try acting and give it my best shot. I was selling pens over the phone making about $50 a week maybe, something like that, and I met his agent. She sent me to read for Elm Street, or meet the people, and just got very lucky and got the role."