Fade to Black

Last night after work I walked over to 421 Broome St., site of Heath Ledger's tragic passing. I haven't seen Heath in many of his movies, nor have I ever understood why so many girls have gone gaga over him. But with his shocking death in the general SoHo neighborhood where I work, I just felt like it was something I should do.

When I got there it was what you'd expect: police and news vans with a decent crowd of reporters and people milling about. I'm not really sure what I was hoping to see. More than anything, I think I just wanted to say I was there since it was only a 10-minute walk, and at that point Ledger was already a headline across the globe.

Yesterday afternoon when a stunned co-worker uttered "Heath Ledger died," the words didn't sound right or real. And as the day went on, it was still hard for me to accept. Heath Ledger is THE JOKER in the new Batman movie. He CAN'T be dead. I continued to wrestle over it in my mind as I tried to focus on my work. And then Metallica's "Fade To Black" started playing on my iPod.

Life it seems to fade away...

Ledger was the star of the first Batman trailer released just a month ago. So much so that it prompted my brother to rhetorically ask, "Is this a Joker movie?"

"It's the most fun I've had with a character and probably will ever have," Ledger told MTV last November. "It was an exhausting process. At the end of the day I couldn't move. I couldn't talk. I was absolutely wrecked."

Based on reports of his physical and mental state in his final days, playing the Joker in The Dark Knight apparently took its toll. Ledger may have gotten so deep in the role that he never found his way out of the dark.

"Last week, I probably slept an average of two hours a night," Ledger told The New York Times in November. "I couldn't stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind was still going."

Like the majority of people, I was surprised as anybody a few years ago when they cast Ledger as the Joker in the next Batman film. I just didn't see it. But the more I thought about it, I had a feeling that the right choice had been made. And although we won't know for sure until July, Ledger has apparently turned in an extraordinary performance. And as a swan song, it will be a haunting, unforgettable one.