Heath Ledger’s Films
The Dark Knight (2008) Ledger lights up the screen as The Joker. I’m Not There (2007) One of seven actors to portray different "versions" of Bob Dylan, Ledger played "Robbie." Candy (2006) Ledger played Dan, a hapless Sydney junkie who tries to kick the habit. Casanova (2005) Period romantic comedy set in 16th-century Venice casts Ledger as the world’s greatest lover. 
Brokeback Mountain (2005) Ledger’s repressed gay cowboy Ennis Del Mar tries to stifle his true feelings. The Brothers Grimm (2005) Ledger’s 19th-century con artist/storyteller Jacob Grimm roams the war-torn countryside with brother Wilhelm (Matt Damon). Lords of Dogtown (2005) As real-life, ’70s-era beach dude Skip, he steers a gang of California skateboarding street urchins to fame and fortune. The Order (2003) His priest Alex character Bernier goes to Rome to investigate mysterious deaths. 
Ned Kelly (2003) Starring as Australia’s 19th-century frontier folk hero, Ledger’s bank robber is by turns brutal and idealistic. The Four Feathers (2002) He’s British soldier Harry Feversham in a tale of 19th-century military cowardice set in the Sudan. Monster’s Ball (2001) As Sonny Grotowski, troubled son of Billy Bob Thornton’s "Hank," the relationship served as backdrop to Halle Berry’s Oscar-winning performance. A Knight’s Tale (2001) Medieval romantic comedy starred Leger as handsome jouster Sir William Thatcher. The Patriot (2000) He plays Revolutionary War soldier Gabriel Martin. Two Hands (1999) As small-time hood Jimmy, he goes on the run from gangsters. First film with Ned Kelly director Gregor Jordan. 10 Things I Hate About You (1999) Romantic comedy set in a Washington. high school cast Leger as hunky Patrick Verona, who eventually falls for spunky classmate (Julia Stiles). Sweat (1996) Ledger gets his first major exposure as Snowy Bowles in 26 episodes of this Australian soap opera.
The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences couldn’t bring itself to nominate The Dark Knight for Best Picture, but one major nod simply could not be denied. The singular sensation that ensures Dark Knight a permanent place in the history of cinema (beyond the movie’s huge box office haul) is the late Heath Ledger’s riveting performance as the Joker.
Despite the Academy’s longstanding bias against popcorn flicks, Ledger is expected to win the Best Supporting Actor trophy Sunday. (The Academy also managed to toss six technical category nominations in the direction of Christopher Nolan’s Batman epic.)
If Ledger wins, he’ll become the second actor to win a posthumous Oscar in the history of the awards, following in the footsteps of Peter Finch, who won Best Actor for his performance in the 1976 film Network.
Ledger’s creepily convincing portrayal of the clown prince of crime in Dark Knight grew beyond the movie itself, inspiring many white-faced fanboys and fangirls to mimic Joker’s look at Comic-Con International. A group of Ledger fans recently started an online petition to retire the Joker from film, saying the actor’s performance should be the final celluloid take on the character.
Only 27 when he arrived in Chicago in April 2007 to shoot The Dark Knight, the Australian actor came to The Joker role primed with a decade’s worth of self-taught craft gleaned over the course of 14 wildly varied movies.
Coming off his Oscar-nominated portrait of tight-lipped gay cowboy Ennis Del Mar in Brokeback Mountain, Ledger transformed himself utterly to inhabit the twisted comic book supervillain, body and soul. The Australian actor died of an accidental prescription drug overdose Jan. 22, 2008, before Dark Knight made it to the screen and transformed Ledger into the eternal face of the Joker.
In this exclusive Wired.com audio (download MP3, or listen to clip embedded at right), you can hear the earmarks of an intensely introspective artist, unmistakable even in March 2004, when it was recorded.
Ledger turned up in a Beverly Hills hotel room in blue jeans, rumpled hair and a scruffy not-quite beard to discuss his Australian frontier biopic Ned Kelly and offer some perspective on a career that would soon shift into high gear.
"I didn’t have any training," said Ledger during the 2004 interview, as he slouched on a couch and smoked a cigarette. "When I first started acting, I was just crap. And since then, I’ve still been kind of figuring it out job by job. I made a lot of mistakes along the way, particularly when I was younger. I was just terrible, and I remember thinking: ‘Shit, should I do this? should I be doing acting?’"
The previous year, Ledger explained, he’d gone 11 months without working because he didn’t want to get stuck in repetitive roles. Familiarity offered little in the way of challenges, he said.
"I could see where I was going wrong," Ledger said. "That’s when I stepped back: ‘Well hang on, at least I’m honest enough to say that I’m bad. If I can see what I’m doing wrong, then I can change it.
"As soon as I figured that out, I was like: ‘Oh, OK, I can change what I was doing, I can be self-critical, I can work from that.’ So I kept learning, did a job, finished it, looked at it, and sort of tore it to pieces, and tore myself to pieces, then improved on the next."
The self-scrutiny drove Ledger to better himself.
"I’m constantly scared and constantly in fear, and that’s kind of what keeps me at it, kind of what drives me because it keeps it exciting," Ledger said. "It keeps testing me."
For Ledger, acting was believing.
"The power of belief, in a sense — it’s one of the strongest of all," he said. "And like religion, if you strongly believe in something, it comes true and it becomes a reality. In acting, I find that as well. If you believe it, you discover a truth and it’s quite spiritual…. Along that path, in discovering that character, you discover a lot about yourself."
Photos courtesy Warner Bros.
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