Heath Ledger was 28 when he died in 2008. Photo / Getty Images
Heath Ledger was 28 when he died in 2008. Photo / Getty Images
New details surrounding the death of Australian actor Heath Ledger have been revealed.
Ledger, who was 28, was found dead by his housekeeper on January 22, 2008. The official cause of his death was ruled to be an accidental overdose of prescription medications, including painkillers, anti-anxiety drugs and sleeping pills.
Now, details about the moments after his family arrived at his home have been revealed by the last director he worked with.
Hollywood director Stephen Gaghan recalled on Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast series Development Hell how the script for Gaghan’s film, an adaptation of Gladwell’s Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, was found beside the actor.
Heath Ledger won a posthumous Oscar as best supporting actor for his role as the Joker in the 2008 movie The Dark Knight.
Noting that his phone number was on the script, Gaghan said he received a call from Ledger’s father Kim, and it left him “speechless”.
“They were there with the body and our script was in bed with him, and your book was on the bedside table,” he told Gladwell. “I think my number was on the script, like written. These guys, as you can imagine, they are in shock and they dialled that number and I don’t know why.”
Gaghan said the call came as he was in an airport with his wife Minnie Mortimer as they were rushing from one place to another, but when he realised what Kim was telling him, he had to sit down.
“I literally just collapse, never happened to me before or since,” he said. “My feet went out from under me. I just literally sat down because I was like, ‘What?’ The emotion, what they were going through, I should not have been a party to in any way really, and yet as a human or as somebody who just cares, I just was there and I was listening and my wife was looking at me.
Stephen Gaghan was due to work with Heath Ledger on the film adaption of Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. Photo / Getty Images
“I remember her face and I was just like, I was speechless. I just listened and listened and listened. It was just really, really sad. And it’s still sad. For me, I just had to put a pin in it.”
After Ledger died, the film did too, he said. He struggled to get a studio to take up the project, finally persuading Universal Studios to sign in 2005. However, he realised while developing the script that the lead role was written for Ledger, not Leonardo DiCaprio, who had just been brought on board.
“I’d gotten to be very, very close with him instantly,” Gaghan said of Ledger. “I just had a real connection with him that was kind of unusual and really special to me.
“I got really excited and I started seeing him as the main character. Once I started seeing that I couldn’t unsee it, and obviously it was very delicate in a way. Leo’s totally cool. I mean, obviously, he has a thousand choices, but in my mind it was a big deal.”
