Heath Ledger died with movie script ‘in bed with him,’ new details reveal

When Heath Ledger died at 28 in 2008, he had plans to be in another movie. 

The Oscar-winning “The Dark Knight” star died of an accidental overdose, and director Stephen Gaghan claimed on a recent podcast appearance that the Australian actor had other aspirations at the time. 

During an episode of the “Developmental Hell” podcast, a spin-off of Malcom Gladwell’s “Revisionist History” show, Gaghan said he had an idea in the early 2000s to turn Gladwell’s book, “Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking,” into a movie. 

But after Ledger’s death, “I just had to put a pin in it,” he said. 

In 2008, after the “Brokeback Mountain” star’s tragic passing, Gaghan got a call from Ledger’s father, Kim, and Ledger’s friend, breaking the news about his death. 

“They were there with the body and our script was in bed with him, and your book was on the bedside table,” Gaghan said. 

“I think my number was on the script, like, written. These guys, as you can imagine, they are in shock, and they dialed that number, and I don’t know why.”

Gaghan, 58, is best known for writing and directing the 2005 political thriller “Syriana,” and he also won a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for writing Stephen Soderbergh’s 2000 film, “Traffic.” 

On the podcast, Gaghan and Gladwell said that they teamed up to make Gladwell’s 2005 book “Blink” into a movie, with Leonardo DiCaprio, 49, in the starring role. 

However, throughout the process, they ended up deciding that Ledger would be better for the role, Gaghan said. 

DiCaprio was “really involved” in pitching the movie to studios, and they had “essentially a green light at Universal [Studios]” for the project. But, after Gaghan met Ledger, his vision for the movie changed, he said. 

“I had met Heath Ledger and I’d gotten to be very very close with him instantly. I just had a real connection with him that was, kind of, unusual and very special to me,” Gaghan explained. 

“I got really excited, and I started seeing him as the main character. Once I started seeing that, I couldn’t unsee it.”

After getting the tragic phone call breaking the news of Ledger’s death, Gaghan said, “I’m in an airport with my wife, [Minnie Mortimer], just going from one place to another, and I literally just collapse, never happened to me before or since. My feet went out from under me. I just literally sat down because I was like, what?” 

He continued, “The emotion, what [Ledger’s father and friend] were going through, I should not have been a party to in any way really, and yet as a human or as somebody who just cares, I just was there and I was listening and my wife was looking at me. I remember her face and I was just like, I was speechless. I just listened and listened and listened. It was just really, really sad. And it’s still sad.”

Ledger’s daughter, Matilda (with Michelle Williams, 43), who was 2 when he died, is now 18. At the time of his death, Ledger had also been in the middle of filming the 2009 movie, “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” for which Jude Law, Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell stepped in to complete.

The Post reached out to Gaghan for comment.