Writer-director Stephen Gaghan is sharing new particulars a few film he was planning to make with Heath Ledger on the time of the “Brokeback Mountain” actor’s dying. 

Appearing on creator Malcolm Gladwell’s “Revisionist History” podcast this week, Gaghan recalled his expertise creating a movie adaptation of Gladwell’s 2005 guide, “Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking,” with Leonardo DiCaprio in thoughts for the starring position.

While engaged on the “Blink” script, Gaghan was launched to Ledger, and in the end determined that he was higher fitted to the half. 

“I’d just had a real connection with him that was kind of unusual and really special to me,” he defined. “I had a feeling that I just love this guy, and I was going to make a bunch of movies with him.”

Sadly, these plans got here to a halt when Gaghan obtained a cellphone name from Ledger’s father and one of many actor’s shut associates, who knowledgeable him that Ledger had been found dead in New York.

“I got a phone call, they were on speakerphone, and it was Heath Ledger’s father, who I had never met,” he informed Gladwell. “The dad and the guy who was closest to him in his professional life, they were there with the body. Our script was in bed with him and your book was on the bedside table.”

He went on to notice: “I think my number was on the script. These guys are, as you can imagine, in shock, and they dialed that number.”

Ledger died Jan. 22, 2008, of an accidental overdose that concerned a number of prescription drugs. At the time of his dying, the 28-year-old had not too long ago accomplished filming on “The Dark Knight,” and would later posthumously obtain an Academy Award for his portrayal of the Joker.

Gaghan, whose Hollywood credit embrace 2000’s “Traffic” and 2005’s “Syriana,” mentioned that he’d by no means spoken publicly about Ledger’s dying previous to his chat with Gladwell.

At the time of the cellphone name, Gaghan and his spouse, Minnie Mortimer, had been touring by an airport.

“I literally just collapse. It’s never happened to me before or since,” he mentioned. “My feet went out from under me. I just literally sat down because I was like: ‘What? What?’ … My wife was looking at me. I remember her face and I was just speechless. I just listened and listened and listened. It was just really, really sad. And it’s still sad.”

Though the “Blink” adaptation fell by the wayside after Ledger’s dying, Gaghan mentioned that he reread the movie’s script prematurely of his podcast interview, and hinted that it would sometime be value revisiting.

“I could be crazy, but I think this script is really good. I think we really had something really special,” he mentioned. “We might have been a little ahead of our time.”

Listen to Gaghan focus on Ledger on “Revisionist History” beneath, starting across the 34:13 mark.