Ledger

Tuesday evening, Pat O’Brien was among a panel of six or so guests to appear on Larry King Live, talking about how he had earlier rushed to the scene outside Heath Ledger’s Manhattan apartment - no doubt to offer some invaluable analysis of the star’s personal life. As he recounted the events, CNN replayed a loop – the second-go-round was in slow motion - of Ledger’s body moving past an assemblage of reporters, photographers, and NY residents. All the shouting and flashbulbs and jockeying for position played out in a spectacle not unlike a Hollywood premiere, if not for the star’s corpse being rolled out on a stretcher. We would later read that the first sight of examiners removing him from the residence was met by yelps of “Body! Body! Body!” from the curious and those paid-by-the-money-shot.

It’s of course a sad day for many reasons, starting with his former wife and their 2-year-old daughter, just like it was for Brad Renfro’s family last week. What’s worse is that Brad Renfro’s death has gone from a tragic story on its own to becoming a link and precursor to a bigger story about a bigger star: it stopped being about Renfro when Heath Ledger was found unconscious. And it stopped being about the end of Heath Ledger’s life when it turned into who broke the story first, and then, “What’s going to happen to the next Batman film?” and “My God, how is Lindsay going to cope with this?”

The 28-year-old’s passing will continue to overshadow the news coming out of Sundance this week, and make the day old announcements of Oscar nominations seem like last year’s news, but only until the next star shoe drops. For every one person in mourning for Ledger as a friend, peer, or admirer of his work on-screen, there’s a hundred that just need their tragicomic celebrity scoops, and another thousand that, truth be told, just want the tragedy.

Heath Ledger reel: Brokeback Mountain, Candy, I’m Not There, and The Dark Knight. (Gawker)

- Edited Wednesday morning

tedzee | Permalink | January 23 2008 | Comments (View)