So I am sitting in my office, doing some work for my internship, and my friend Steve shoots me an IM.
"Dude, Heath Ledger is dead"
I really can't describe my feelings or thoughts without profanity. I was utterly stunned. In the last couple of months or so I have read, heard, seen and talked about Ledger so much in the context of the new Dark Knight movie. All of it positive, all of it pleasantly surprised.
However, as surprised as I was at how well he seems to handle the Joker character--in my opinion the top character in comic book history in terms of depth, vitality, and intrigue--is how mortified I was to learn of his death.
I, like any other 20-something, first was introduced to the young actor when he played against Julia Stiles in Ten Things I Hate About You. The man was funny, charming, charismatic and had a decent set of pipes. Though I was not a fan of the idea of Knight's Tale, I heard nothing but how good he was in a pretty lame movie. Then, in a breakout role, Ledger played Billy Bob Thorton's son in Monster's Ball, an amazing film and a seriously deep role for the actor.
The hopeless romantic and 8-year-old-can't-grasp-death kid in me wants to believe that its some kind of viral ad campaign for The Dark Knight movie. We've seen so many guerrilla type publicity stunts from the Warner Bros. and DC Comics camps that we can't really think about his death without a small, somewhat muted, alarm going off in the back of our heads. Were that it were only a stunt, that this actor--who was supposed to blow up in Hollywood on the heels of his performance in The Dark Knight--was still with us. If only it was a joke.
"Dude, Heath Ledger is dead"
I really can't describe my feelings or thoughts without profanity. I was utterly stunned. In the last couple of months or so I have read, heard, seen and talked about Ledger so much in the context of the new Dark Knight movie. All of it positive, all of it pleasantly surprised.
However, as surprised as I was at how well he seems to handle the Joker character--in my opinion the top character in comic book history in terms of depth, vitality, and intrigue--is how mortified I was to learn of his death.
I, like any other 20-something, first was introduced to the young actor when he played against Julia Stiles in Ten Things I Hate About You. The man was funny, charming, charismatic and had a decent set of pipes. Though I was not a fan of the idea of Knight's Tale, I heard nothing but how good he was in a pretty lame movie. Then, in a breakout role, Ledger played Billy Bob Thorton's son in Monster's Ball, an amazing film and a seriously deep role for the actor.
The hopeless romantic and 8-year-old-can't-grasp-death kid in me wants to believe that its some kind of viral ad campaign for The Dark Knight movie. We've seen so many guerrilla type publicity stunts from the Warner Bros. and DC Comics camps that we can't really think about his death without a small, somewhat muted, alarm going off in the back of our heads. Were that it were only a stunt, that this actor--who was supposed to blow up in Hollywood on the heels of his performance in The Dark Knight--was still with us. If only it was a joke.
No comments:
Post a Comment