No one has proven he committed suicide and how, without the obligitory suicide note, would anyone ever know? I'm of the belief that it was a terrible accidental overdose of a prescribed drug.

NYtimes

It is a physically and mentally draining role - his Joker is a "psychopathic, mass-murdering, schizophrenic clown with zero empathy" he said cheerfully - and, as often happens when he throws himself into a part, he is not sleeping much.

"Last week I probably slept an average of two hours a night," he said. "I couldn't stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind was still going." One night he took an Ambien, which failed to work. He took a second one and fell into a stupor, only to wake up an hour later, his mind still racing.
Even as he spoke, Mr. Ledger was hard-pressed to keep still. He got up and poured more coffee. He stepped outside into the courtyard and smoked a cigarette. He shook his hair out from under its hood, put a rubber band around it, took out the rubber band, put on a hat, took off the hat, put the hood back up. He went outside and had another cigarette. Polite and charming, he nonetheless gave off the sense that the last thing he wanted to do was delve deep into himself for public consumption. "It can be a little distressing to have to overintellectualize yourself," is how he put it, a little apologetically.

JustPressPlay.com

Michael Caine: 'Heath Ledger frightened the life out of me.'

Michael Caine has been talking to Australian papers about Heath Ledger's portrayal of The Joker, and it's sounding real good. As quoted on Batman-on-Film, the actor journalists that the production's biggest worry when making the sequel was the handling of Batman's arch-nemesis The Joker, and the inevitable comparison that will be made to Jack Nicholson's famous turn.

"Jack Nicholson was the greatest Joker so, you know, how do you top that? Well, Heath Ledger's done it and he's extraordinary," Caine boasted. "He's gone in a completely different direction to Jack. Jack was like a clown figure, benign but wicked, maybe a killer old uncle. He could be funny and make you laugh. Heath is like a really scary psychopath. I did one scene with him and he was ready to go and had to come up in a lift and raid our place. I didn't see him for rehearsal and when he came out of the lift he was so incredible I forgot my lines."

If making a smooth and professional veteran like Caine forgetting his lines is not an accomplishment, then what the hell is?

"He frightened the life out of me," Caine added. "His Joker is going to be a hell of a revelation in this picture."

"Jack Nicholson was the greatest Joker so, you know, how do you top that?

heath ledger stars in a fag promo video and two years later he's dead?
i guess God didn't like the vid.