...Aussie actor, Heath Ledger, was found dead in his NY apartment yesterday. He was twenty-eight-years-old, and the father of a two-year-old daughter, Matilda. Rest In Peace.
I remember years ago, back when I used to read Vanity Fair on a monthly basis, they put Ledger on the cover and called him, "the next big thing," or something similarly asinine and completely out of perspective for a young actor who didn't really have anything remarkable under his belt. Which, of course, doesn't really mean anything other than that he'd had the good sense to hire a PR person who had access to the likes of Graydon Carter. Whoo. Big hairy deal. Vanity Fair is notorious for this sort of stuff. They do it all the time, and many a promising actor's career has gone up in flames (Gretchen Mol, thy name is legend). Surprisingly, Ledger slowly carved out a body of work that did, indeed, live up to the hype. While I never saw Brokeback Mountain, everyone who did and who talked to me about it said he was absolutely remarkable in it. I was---and am---sincerely looking forward to his portrayal of The Joker in The Dark Knight. If the trailer is anything to go by, well, it should be astonishing.
The coverage of his death isn't surprising, nor is the fact that he, probably, died of a drug overdose. What is surprising, although it shouldn't be, is that the Westboro Baptist Church is announcing that, yes, indeed, they will be picketing his funeral because of his portrayal of a gay cowboy in Brokeback Mountain. (I would rather die than link the church, so here's a photo of the press release. If you want to go find them, type "G0d Hates Fags" into Google and see what pops up.)
{press release found at WWTDD, along with scintillating commentary}
Yes, these are the same people who regularly picket the funerals of soldiers, because, by their reasoning, the soldiers deserved to die in Iraq because America loves gays, hence America deserves to be punished with dead soldiers. They show up at the funerals to make this known, you know, in case someone couldn't follow their math.
Now they're going to picket a man's funeral because of a character he portrayed.
You know, I'm not a big fan of church bombings. Really, I'm not. I find them atrocious, reprehensible, ad nauseam, ad infinitum. But I might be willing to put aside that loathing for a minute or two if, perhaps, someone would put a big chunk of C4 under their foundation and blow them all to Kingdom Come during a Sunday service.
I mean, look at it this way: they could finally find out if God really is as pissed off about gays as they say He is. It's more about sending them on a fact finding mission than domestic terrorism. Really and truly.*
This is a work of satire, ok? Don't take it seriously.
Posted by Kathy at January 23, 2008 11:56 AM | TrackBack