Heath Ledger’s Final, Haunting Performance In ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’ Is On Netflix

No matter how good or bad it turned out to be, the 2009 movie The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, directed by Terry Gilliam, was always going to be an incredibly notable and important moment in film history, because of the circumstances surrounding its production. Specifically, this was the movie that Heath Ledger was filming when he died of an accidental prescription drug overdose in January 2008. After production shut down for a time, filming resumed, with Ledger’s role taken up by a trio of A-list leading men: Jude Law, Johnny Depp, and Colin Farrell. These circumstances likely gave the film a far bigger profile than it likely would have. On the flip side, the surrealist nature of the film made it unusually possible to re-cast a lead role like Ledger’s in the manner that Gilliam did.

One of the persistent rumors surrounding Heath Ledger’s death was that the process of filming his role as The Joker in 2008’s The Dark Knight was to blame; specifically that the dark chaos of that role seeped into Ledger’s psyche and he was unable to shake it and became troubled. And while that theory has been debunked by his family members and those close to him, the fact remains that The Dark Knight was a long and challenging filmmaking process. He followed that film up with a strange and ambitious project called The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which re-teamed Ledger with his Brothers Grimm director Terry Gilliam. Gilliam’s reputation as a director is as much about runaway, snake-bit productions as it is about the surrealist quality of the on-screen product. In this, Ledger plays an enigmatic drifter who hooks up with a traveling troupe of performers (including Andrew Garfield in one of his pre-breakout performances), led by the thousand-year-old Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer). The titular imaginarium is this magical realm that bends reality and is altogether strange and fantastical.

As reported by Peter Biskind in a 2009 Vanity Fair article, the production was long and involved, with the London shoot contributing to Ledger’s increased sleeplessness; he also got sick with what many said was early-stage pneumonia. Said Gilliam in the article:

“One day, he showed up with a terrible cough, shivering. He was clearly bloody sick. And completely soaked in sweat. We called a doctor, who said, ‘This is the beginning of pneumonia. You need antibiotics. Go home and rest.’ He said, ‘No way. I’m not going to go home, because I can’t sleep, and I’ll be just thinking about the situation. I’d rather stay here and work.’ But he would arrive in the morning completely knackered. He looked awful, because of lack of sleep and just the shit he was going through with the lawyers. By the end of the day he was beaming, glowing with energy. It was like everything was put into the work, because that was the joy; that’s what he loved to do. The words were just pouring out. It was like he was channeling.”

And later, after Ledger died:

“He desperately wanted to sleep. And he finally got the big sleep. I don’t know if it was the combination of his tiredness with his emotional state. I wish I had the answer. It really bothers me that I can’t make sense out of it. There was nothing grand or dramatic about it. It just happened. It’s still a big mystery.”

While initially it seemed like production would cease for good, Gilliam’s ultimate solution was to take advantage of the fact that the half of the film that wasn’t yet shot was supposed to be the surrealist stuff that happens inside the Imaginarium. Which made it easier to re-cast the role. Gilliam turned to three of Ledger’s real-life friends, Jude Law, Colin Farrell, and Johnny Depp, who each stepped in as another guise of Ledger’s character. It’s reported that other actors — specifically Tom Cruise — offered their services but were turned down because they didn’t know Ledger that well personally.

Were The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus less of a footnote to film history, it’s hard to say what we’d think of it. If Ledger hadn’t died, the film’s biggest hook — the trio of surrealist guises for his character — doesn’t happen. The film itself is a solid, bizarre Gilliam yarn, featuring Plummer in all sorts of crazy, mystical getups and Tom Waits giving a deliciously raspy-voiced performance as the Devil. Oh, and Game of Thrones‘ Gwendoline Christie in a very brief appearance as “Classy Shopper 2”:

The scenes between Ledger and Andrew Garfield feel particularly meaningful in retrospect; it’s not quite a passing of the torch from one charismatic, soulful young leading man to another, but certainly a reaching across between two strictly-defined “eras.” At the very least it’s the Joker and Spider-Man crossing paths.

The film is well worth checking out, for Ledger’s final performance, for the pinch-hitting done by his friends and fellow actors, and for the visually ambitious film itself.

The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus is currently streaming on Netflix