This is exactly what I was talking about, this whole “cursed role”
thing surrounding The Joker, all of it stemming from Heath’s death. I
see posts like this every day in the Heath tag and there’s a few things
I’d like to get off my chest.Heath writing the infamous Joker
journal is a prime example of method acting, nothing more, nothing less.
In an interview not too long before Heath’s death, he told Empire magazine
“I sat around in a hotel room in London for about a month, locked
myself away, formed a little diary and experimented with voices — it was
important to try to find a somewhat iconic voice and laugh.” It wasn’t
about him being consumed by the role, it was more about him establishing
his own interpretation of an already established and iconic character.
Heath isn’t the only actor to utilize method acting in order to submerse
himself into a role. No one questioned Daniel Day-Lewis’s mental
stability after living as Abraham Lincoln for the entire duration of filming or
insisting on only eating meat he killed himself for Last of the
Mohicans.People like to use what Jack Nicholson said to a paparazzi
as a credible source. He said it in passing and probably facetiously.
If he was really serious, would he have laughed about it? And just as an
aside, why the hell would Heath go to Nicholson for advice about the
role anyway? He never once stated that Nicholson was an inspiration for
the role in any way. If anything, he’d want to distance himself from an
already established portrayal of The Joker.Everybody forgets
Heath went on to do The Imaginarium of Doctor Panassus after The Dark
Knight. Filming for The Dark Knight had been completed months before his
death and he was already on to other roles and bigger opportunities. He
wasn’t stuck on the character, he had moved on.The Joker role
didn’t drive Heath crazy. It seems reductive to say what happened to
Heath happened because of the character. What happened was an
unfortunate accident, not the result of being tormented by this so
called “insanity” after portraying The Joker. The medications Heath was
taking were for conditions that had been around long before he was The
Joker and for illnesses after the role. It sucks that he is plagued with
“suicide” over his name just because it’s more fitting to the media.
The media is pushing the idea of this cursed role as a selling point.
This is obviously a publicity stunt released to get everyone worked up
about how “dark” Leto’s Joker is going to be. It’s tasteless how people
are comparing this to Heath’s death when they are not related. I can’t
believe people continue to perpetuate this myth over the real
explanation. The treatment towards Leto’s portrayal would not be happening without the Heath “cautionary tale” bullshit preceding it.Jared Leto is not being haunted by this role, he’s just being an asshole.
Also, Mark Hamill is currently fine