12 Disturbing Truths Behind Heath Ledger’s Joker

We all remember Heath Ledger’s Joker. He was one of the youngest actors to take on the role, and as we all know, did almost too good of a job of portraying the villain on the brink of madness. Many people thought that his methods of ‘getting in to character’ went too far, causing his obsession to lead to depression to lead to his death from overdose. Those close to him said they saw Heath change through his time portraying the character. While he gave us one of the best Jokers in Batman history, let’s take a look at what it really meant for Heath Ledger to become the man behind the Joker. 1. His Joker terrified Michael Caine Caine is somewhat of a staple within the Batman franchise, and he admitted that there was a clear difference between Jack Nicholson and Ledger’s portrayal of the villain – Jack’s character had a sense of humour, which Ledger showed a true psychopath. The first time that Caine saw Heath in his full Joker makeup was during the filming of the elevator scene, and Ledger was so intense that Caine forgot his lines. (Maggie Gyllenhaal, who played Batman’s love interest, was so scared of him that she couldn’t even look at Heath when he came in to the room). 2. Heath originally wanted to play Batman We can relate to this one though, who doesn’t want to be Batman? Christian Bale ended up getting the role, and producers later realised that he would be good for the role of the Joker. Can you imagine how different the movie would be if he played Batman instead? 3. He locked himself away Before the filming for the movie started, Ledger locked himself up in a motel for 43 days – he wanted to isolate himself from the world the way that the Joker would, to understand the feeling of being completely and truly alone. He got so in to it that his disassociation started to affect his relationship with his partner Michelle Williams. 4. He was the first actor to win an Oscar for playing a villain The Dark Knight was nominated for eight awards during the 81st Academy Awards. Ledger won the Best Supporting Actor for his role as the Joker, being the first and only to win in any of the categories for a movie like that – superhero movies don’t tend to be something that the Academy looks for, but Heath was the exception. 5. He was inspired by Clockwork Orange While researching for his portrayal of the Joker, Ledger gained huge inspiration from the 1971 classic Clockwork Orange. He looked at the main character Alex De Large, played by Malcom McDowell – his portrayal of his character was astounding at that time. This is how he really developed the strange mannerisms that the Joker possessed. 6. ‘The Joker Journal’ You’ve probably heard about this one before. While on set, Ledger was often seen carrying around a diary. It was revealed that within this journal, Ledger wrote as if he was the Joker – there was a list. A pretty messed up list. It contained ramblings of a mad man, things that the Joker might find funny – geniuses that had brain damage, sombreros, blind babies. This is some pretty strong indication that Ledger may have been a little bit mad himself. It just goes way beyond the protocol of somebody trying to get in character for a movie. 7. He wanted Christian Bale to beat him As we know, Ledger liked to really get into his role. In the interrogation scene, there was a brutal scene where Batman beat up the Joker – and we thought the combat was acted out immaculately! It looked so real. Turns out, that’s because it was real. He wanted the scenes to be as authentic as possible, and asked Bale to beat him up as hard as possible. So what we saw during that scene was a real fight – we can only imagine how much that must’ve hurt. 8. He did his own makeup Makeup artists weren’t in charge of the Joker look that Ledger adapted, or not originally anyway. He wanted it to look like how a man would do it with a bunch of cheap makeup – so that’s what he did. The distressed yet original look was approved by the directors, and so it was up to the makeup team to recreate the rough, psychopath look every day for shooting. 9. Ledger looked like a madman on set As is common knowledge by now, Ledger liked to stay in character as much as possible. This lead to a skateboarding Joker disturbing the cast and production team during breaks – yes, Ledger loved to skateboard and did it often while on set, but imagine that in full Joker costume. However apparently he was always in good spirits and would often try to make the crew and cast laugh during filming, and the environment was always happy and very relaxes – which would’ve balanced out the fact that he looked like a crazy psychopath all the time. 10. His scars are called a “Glasgow Smile” A Glasgow smile is a gang scare originated from Scotland, and was how the gang would scar their enemies. It’s usually done with knifes but often credit cards were used to keep the mouth open. He wanted his scars to be different from anything else people had seen – The Joker in the comic books didn’t have any scarring, but that didn’t stop him. Tommy Flanagan from Sons of Anarchy has a similar scar, but his are real from a time that he got jumped after a bar fight. 11. His death impacted the movie Heath Ledger died shortly after filming finished, and rumours sparked that the effects of his commitment to his role of The Joker led to his depression. He wasn’t around to promote the movie, and left it with an air of sadness around it. He was also involved in the movie The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus but wasn’t able to finish it. Colin Farrell, Johnny Depp and Jude Law stepped in to play variations of Ledger to complete the filming. Instead of collecting their paychecks, they donated them to Heath’s daughter Matilda. According to sources, Heath hadn’t updated his will to include his daughter, so the actors gave up their paychecks to go towards her future care. 12.The Generational Mask During the bank robbery scene, The Joker is seen wearing a very unusual mask that you wouldn’t normally picture on The Joker. However there is some symbolism to the choice of the mask – a very similar mask was seen in an episode of a 1960’s Batman series. The mask has quite a bit of history since Cesar Romero wore it. Credits: gosocial.co Share this story on Facebook with your friends. Related: 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Cesar Romero ‘I Dream Of Jeannie’: 11 Uncanny Facts You Never Knew