SUPER EXCLUSIVE Heath Ledger’s Joker has the last laugh
By Ruel S. De Vera
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Last updated 17:14:00 07/11/2008
LOS ANGELES, California—Perhaps because he was so good-looking, Heath Ledger had always worked hard to convince people he was much more than a pretty face. It is tragic that the best proof of his immense acting prowess will go on display long after his death last January of a drug overdose.
His performance in “The Dark Knight” is triumphant in every way. “He does a fantastic, superb, iconic villain,” Christian Bale says of Ledger’s Joker. “If Chris (Nolan) decides to make a third movie, I don’t know how the hell he’s going to have a superior villain to what he created as the Joker. It’s wonderful to see when an actor just completely immerses himself in a role. He’s portrayed it in a way that nobody’s ever seen before. I do think it’s going to be remembered for the ages. It’s a wonderful thing to have the pleasure of working opposite him and seeing the satisfaction he was getting from playing the Joker.”
The Perth, Australia native first got noticed in 1999’s “10 Things I Hate About You” and quickly drew notice for his movie-star features, playing leading men in “A Knight’s Tale” and “Casanova.” But Ledger took risks with his acting, seeking edgier parts in the Bob Dylan biopic “I’m Not There” and the skating flick “Lords of Dogtown.”
It was his performance as the anguished cowboy Ennis in 2005’s “Brokeback Mountain” that garnered him an Oscar nomination.
Unusual choice
Yet when Ledger was first cast as the Joker, it seemed an unusual choice. Producer Emma Thomas says they “always knew that would be the biggest challenge in casting the film, because it’s such an iconic character and we knew we had to have somebody who could obliterate any previous iteration of the character.”
Nolan had known Ledger for a while. “I had met with Heath several times over the years for different projects and nothing had come of it, but we had wanted to work together,” the director recalls.
“He heard we were doing the Joker for this film and before we even had a script, he met with me and explained he wanted to do it. We talked about what that character would be in this telling of the film. We talked about the character as a force of anarchy, as somebody devoted to chaos. Heath completely got that and he very clearly had the confidence to do it. He took a leap of faith in us.”
The film’s writers saw the Joker as the ultimate Batman nemesis, because of what makes them different.
“I don’t think he has a weakness. There are certain points in the movie where even if the Joker dies, I don’t think he cares,” David Goyer answers. “Maybe you can make the case that he has one weakness, and that’s his affection for Batman,” Jonathan Nolan notes. Goyer adds, “His other weakness is that he gets bored.”
Ledger’s co-stars could feel that Ledger was on a roll. “I could tell as soon as I began to work with him that he was in a place that’s very rare and unusual even for the most talented and experienced actors, where he had hit a stride where he was absolutely free,” Maggie Gyllenhaal says. “Working with someone in that place is so fun because they’ll take anything you give them and throw anything at you, and that’s what you always want.”
Gary Oldman concurs: “I had a great time working with Heath. He’s amazing in the film. You felt that you were really in the company of something special in this film, and I think his work will be really celebrated.”
It was just breathtaking to watch,” says Nolan.
Thomas understands that Ledger’s performance will be compared to that of Jack Nicholson in “Batman,” as directed by Tim Burton.
“They’re completely unlike each other in every way,” she says. “The obvious thing to say is that Jack Nicholson’s Joker is campier, but the incredible thing that Heath did with the role—he’s terrifying, unpredictable and scary—is that he’s also kind of funny. You can’t help but laugh even if you don’t want to.”
Those reactions may explain the early buzz surrounding a possible Oscar nomination for Ledger, something deserved according to his colleagues.
“The Oscar process comes from someplace else, from people who have seen the movie or watched what you’ve been doing from the material we’ve put out,” producer Charles Rove clarifies. “What’s really rewarding is it’s actually coming toward us rather than us having to put anything out there.”
Good time
Contrary to some reports, Ledger was actually having a very good time and was not troubled or depressed on the Dark Knight set.
“If somebody’s been on a movie set and seen the way movies are made, it’s a very technical, very artificial environment, however much you try to make it real for the actor, it’s not,” Nolan explains.
“Heath was an extraordinary actor, able to come to work and have fun with it. When the camera is on, he’d channel an incredible intensity. Christian Bale very similarly is someone who’s very fun to have on set. It’s the skill of the great film actor. I think it’s easy to misunderstand what that skill is. It’s a real testament to Heath’s gifts as an actor that he could create this monster that’s so utterly unlike who he was in real life and on set. ”
Ledger had already completed his work on “The Dark Knight” and was working on another film, Terry Gilliam’s “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” when he was found dead in his Manhattan apartment. That film will be released next year with Ledger’s friends Johnny Depp, Colin Farell and Jude Law pitching in to finish the movie.
Everyone mourns the loss of such a talented actor cut down in his prime. Bale, a longtime friend of Ledger, declines to talk much about his closeness to Ledger.
“We had a mutual love for our children,” he says. “He loved his daughter and we had a great many conversations about that.”
And Bale has one enduring and fitting memory of Ledger—a man moving at a different speed: “Heath was one hell of a driver. We would go go-karting and he would be beating the stunt drivers. He was phenomenal. We would always be stunned. We would go out and race and the great thing was to try and beat Heath because, he was just kicking everybody’s ass on the track all the time.”
