This Just In–Fred Phelps Is a Monster

January 23, 2008 at 2:27 pm (Uncategorized)
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Wow.  You know, I knew this was coming, but…ugh.

From our good old friends at the Westboro Baptist Church comes a statement on Heath Ledger:

Brokeback Mountain star – Heath Ledger – is dead. WBC will picket his funeral.

‘Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind; it is abomination.’ Lev. 18:22. ‘For because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.’ Eph. 5:6.

Yes. WBC will picket this pervert’s funeral, in religious protest and warning: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked.” Gal. 6:7. Heath Ledger thought it was great fun defying God Almighty and his plain word; to wit: God Hates Fags! & Fag-Enablers! Ergo, God hates the sordid, tacky bucket of slime seasoned with vomit known as ‘Brokeback Mountain’ – and He hates all persons having anything whatsovever to do with it.

Heath Ledger is now in Hell, and has begun serving his eternal sentence there – beside which, nothing else about Heath Ledger is relevant or consequential.

No, I’m not surprised that good old fucking Fred and the church will be picketing Heath’s funeral.  These are the people, in case you aren’t aware, who have been picketing soldier’s funerals because of the US’s “tolerance” of homosexuality.  They’ve picketed the memorials for Columbine, the Sago Mine disaster, and the Westroads Mall shooting, among others, and were going to picket the Virginia Tech Massacre memorials and the October 2006 Amish school shooting, but withdrew in exchange for an hour of radio time.  I could go on, but I’m not going to.  I’m not surprised, but I am sickened, as usual.  Phelps, die in a fucking fire.  No, seriously.  Please.  Walk into a fire and burn to death.  It’s the quickest way to Jesus.  God told me.  Seriously, we can do it together.

You go first.

–Jer

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Ledger Autopsy Inconclusive; TMZ & Other Gossip Sites Full Of Shit

January 23, 2008 at 2:06 pm (Uncategorized)
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Okay, so the second part of the title is my own thoughts and not real news…but hey, it’s not like TMZ reports real news, so turnabout’s fair play, right?

Anyway…from CNN.com, which is at least a less disreputable news source then Harvey Levin:

An autopsy Wednesday morning on actor Heath Ledger was inconclusive, and a cause-of-death determination will take 10 to 14 days, a medical examiner’s spokeswoman said.

The Academy Award-nominated actor was found dead Tuesday of a possible drug overdose in a Lower Manhattan apartment, the New York Police Department said. He was 28.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said Wednesday that Ledger was found face down in a normal sleeping position and not at the foot of his bed, as had been previously reported.

Kelly said technicians collected a $20 bill found in the apartment for testing, because of the way it was folded.

Flowers, notes and a candle were left by mourning fans on the sidewalk outside the Soho apartment building.

“You did great work and I know your fans were looking forward to what more you had to offer,” read one note.

Ledger’s former girlfriend, actress Michelle Williams, who was shooting a movie in Sweden, was informed of his death late Tuesday night, a movie production company spokesman said.

Williams left early Wednesday morning with 2-year-old daughter Matilda Rose, the spokesman said. Ledger was the child’s father.

Ledger, Oscar-nominated for his role in “Brokeback Mountain,” was found by a housekeeper trying to wake him for an appointment with a masseuse, said police spokesman Paul Browne.

Browne later told reporters some prescription medications were found in the room, including sleeping pills. He said the pills were not “scattered around,” as had been reported.

No note was found, and there was no indication of foul play, Browne said.

“As previously reported.”  “As had been reported.”  Both of these facts were reported primarily by TMZ, which is a gossip site.  And I’ve been noticing something interesting with the Ledger death; almost everyone’s been going to TMZ or PerezHilton.com to get their news.  My initial thought goes something like this:

ARE YOU MOTHERFUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!?!?

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I’ve made the occasional foray to TMZ or TheSuperficial.com while I’m bored at work.  Why?  Because I’m an admitted pop-culture freak, and I can usually get a chuckle out of something there.  But when I want real news?  I go to the BBC or Associated Press reports, or maybe CNN.  I don’t go to a place where they don’t even try to hide the fact that they’re posting sensationalist crap in order to get website hits.  I mean Jesus H. Christ, gimme a fuckin’ break.  Yes, TMZ sometimes gets something right.  When they’re reporting every gods-damned hour about whatever tiny little tidbit they can pull out of the traffic cop who was assigned to guard the front door, they’re bound to get SOMETHING right.

The latest news, of course, is that TMZ was reporting that drug packets and white powder on the $20 bill in question; information that reputable sources contradict.  Ahh, TMZ, always looking to smear someone’s reputation, even post-mortem, for a “headline.”

I guess you can’t expect any better from them, though.  After all, Harvey Levin, the scumbag legal reporter who famously nearly caused OJ Simpson’s murder case to get thrown out by inaccurately reporting that prosecutor Marcia Clark searched OJ’s home before a warrant was issued, is most known for such crap as Celebrity Justice.  And he was named 2007 Journalist of the Year by a media watchdog site called Tabloid Baby.  Sounds impressive, right?  Not when you realize Tabloid Baby’s rationale…

“Who did more damage to entertainment reporting in 2007 than Harvey Levin?… he and his gutter operation… almost singlehandedly transformed Hollywood entertainment reporting into a gutter-level street battle fueled by self-hatred, jealousy and anger, with no concern for what once determined greatness, excellence or fame…”

Yeah, that’s some great credentials, Harvey.  Asshat.  My TMZ-reading days are officially fucking over.

Oh, also…side note that pisses me off.  Who owns TMZ?  That’s right…Time-Warner/AOL.  The same people who own CNN.  Deplorable.

Shit like this really pisses me off; when someone’s dead, the last thing you should be doing is posting unfounded speculation about how they died.  Heath Ledger has family.  He has fans world-wide.  He has a DAUGHTER.  They don’t need to hear this shit.  I mean, yes, do I post snarky shit about Britney Spears & Amy Winehouse, Paris Hilton & Lindsey Lohan?  Of course.  But will I be pointing and laughing when they die?  Hell no.  Because in death, people deserve respect.

Except for Fred Phelps, but that’s a whole different bucket of worms.  I’m calling in sick and holding a fucking party the day Phelps kicks it.

–Jer

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Ledger Death–An Interesting (If Entirely Sad) Thought

January 22, 2008 at 4:20 pm (Uncategorized)
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Having been following the story as it develops, I found myself on a New York Times article with an interview conducted with Ledger while filming The Dark Knight.  It provides some interesting information…

It all tied him in knots. “I stressed out a little too much,” Mr. Ledger said.

He tends to do that. He is here in London filming the latest episode of the “Batman” franchise, “The Dark Knight.” (Mr. Bale, as it happens, plays Batman; Mr. Ledger plays the Joker.) 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.

Conducting a tour of the house, which he is renting for a few months, he made wry remarks about the art. One painting depicts a crowd of creatures who appear to be in hell, but who seem determined to extract as much sexual pleasure as they can from their eternity of free time; Mr. Ledger has turned another one around and hung it upside down, to no apparent ill advantage.

An open bag with clothes spilling out lay on the floor of the master bedroom. “I’m kind of addicted to moving,” Mr. Ledger said, perhaps on account of having had to shuttle back and forth after his parents’ divorce, when he was 11. He carries his interests around with him, and his kitchen table was awash in objects: a chess set, assorted books, various empty glasses, items of clothing. Here too was his Joker diary, which he began compiling four months before filming began. It is filled with images and thoughts helpful to the Joker back story, like a list of things the Joker would find funny. (AIDS is one of them.) Mr. Ledger seemed almost embarrassed that the book had been spotted, as if he had been caught trying to get extra credit in school.

“He’s very disciplined and takes it very seriously,” said Marc Forster, who directed Mr. Ledger in “Monster’s Ball,” in which he played a troubled prison guard. Mr. Ledger came to the part at the last minute, but caught on quickly. “Heath at the time was something like 22, and I thought: ‘He’s incredible. He’s so smart and so intuitive and so observant, and he really understood the part and the character.’”

I don’t want to jump to conclusions…but look at that bit in the third paragraph about being unable to sleep and taking Ambien that failed to work.  It’s hardly inconceivable that the OD from sleeping pills was a result of his continued inability to sleep.  Method acting takes a toll on actors from time to time, and I can’t help but think that this is an accidental death that has nothing to do with a drug problem.

–Jer

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Heath Ledger Found Dead In New York Apartment

January 22, 2008 at 3:05 pm (Uncategorized)
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I just…wow. Seriously, talk about your Tuesday shocker. According to the New York Times (and now the Associated Press and several other outlets), Heath Ledger has died:

The actor Heath Ledger was found dead this afternoon in an apartment in Manhattan, according to the New York City police. Signs pointed to a suicide or an accidental overdose, police sources said. Mr. Ledger was 28.

At 3:31 p.m., a masseuse arrived the fourth-floor apartment of the building, at 421 Broome Street in SoHo, for an appointment with Mr. Ledger, the police said. The masseuse was let in to the home by a housekeeper, who then knocked on the door of the bedroom Mr. Ledger was in. When no one answered, the housekeeper and the masseuse opened the bedroom and found Mr. Ledger naked and unconscious on a bed, with pills scattered around his body. They moved his body to the floor and attempted to revive him, but he did not respond. They immediately called the authorities.

The police said they did not suspect foul play. Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the office of the city’s chief medical examiner, Dr. Charles S. Hirsch, said that employees of the office were at the apartment and that an autopsy would be conducted on Wednesday.

Police officials have said that the apartment was owned by the actress Mary-Kate Olsen,
Officials said they believed Ms. Olsen, 21, was in California and that Mr. Ledger had been living in her apartment. Ms. Olsen attended the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, for the premiere of “The Wackness,” a film in which she stars with the actor Ben Kingsley. It was not clear where she went after the film screening.

Mr. Ledger, a native of Perth, Australia, won acclaim for his role as a co-star in “Brokeback Mountain” (2005). The film, based on a short story by Annie Proulx about two cowboys who fall in love, won critical acclaim. Reviewing the film in The New York Times, the critic Stephen Holden wrote, “Mr. Ledger magically and mysteriously disappears beneath the skin of his lean, sinewy character. It is a great screen performance, as good as the best of Marlon Brando and Sean Penn.” Mr. Ledger was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in January 2006.

Mr. Ledger met the actress Michelle Williams while filming ‘’Brokeback Mountain.” The two actors fell into a romance and moved to Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, where their comings and goings were widely noted by the celebrity press. They had a daughter, Matilda Rose, who was born on Oct. 28, 2005. The couple separated last year.

Mr. Ledger’s first Hollywood film was the teenage romantic comedy “10 Things I Hate About You” (1999). He later appeared in romantic-hero roles in films like “A Knight’s Tale” (2001) and “Casanova” (2005).

Mr. Ledger was also cast as The Joker in the latest Batman installment, “The Dark Knight,” set to be released this summer.

In an interview in London for an article published in November, Mr. Ledger told The New York Times, ‘’I feel like I’m wasting time if I repeat myself.” He said in the interview that he was not proud of his latest role, in Todd Haynes’s “I’m Not There,” in which Mr. Ledger was one of a half-dozen actors depicting the musician Bob Dylan. ‘’I feel the same way about everything I do. The day I say, ‘It’s good’ is the day I should start doing something else,” said in the interview.

As news of Mr. Ledger’s death made its way across the Internet, the Police Department issued a fairly terse summary of the death: “ON TUESDAY, 01/22/08, AT APPROXIMATELY 1530 HOURS, IN THE CONFINES OF THE 5 PRECINCT, POLICE RESPONDED TO 421 BROOME STREET AND FOUND A M/W/28 UNCONSCIOUS. THE VICTIM WAS PRONOUNCED DOA AT THE SCENE. M.E.’S OFFICE TO DETERMINE THE CAUSE OF DEATH. INVESTIGATION CONTINUES.”

Calls by The Times to Mara Buxbaum, a publicist for Mr. Ledger, and Steve Alexander, the actor’s agent, were not immediately returned this afternoon.

I don’t really know what to say about this one yet. Obviously, it’s an early report; there’s currently conflicting information of whether the apartment was his or Mary-Kate Olson’s, and whether the death was suicide or accidental. Gossip site TMZ is all over it, as usual, and has posted all sorts of information that may or may not be true.

I’m a huge Heath Ledger fan, even some of his less-then-quality films like Ten Things I Hate About You and The Order. (I never could bring myself to like A Knight’s Tale, though.) Obviously, his performance in Brokeback Mountain was nothing short of amazing. I was so utterly jazzed about his Joker in The Dark Knight…this is just kind of shocking to me.

We’ll have to see how it progresses. It doesn’t change that he’s dead obviously, but personally, I hope it was accidental, and not suicide.

UPDATE: It appears the apartment was not Olsen’s, and the medication aspect has been changed from “pills scattered around his body” to “sleeping pills — both prescription medication and nonprescription — on a night table.”. The OD could very well be accidental.

–Jer

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