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edge. Not being the perfect father and the perfect

partner to the mother of your child was really get-

ting at him. Maybe a lot of the excesses he sur-

rounded himself with came from that crisis. And

he was working on these intense films, and the

hours were crazy.

Gerry Grennell, vocal coach and friend:He missed his

girl; he missed his family. He was desperately

unhappy. The breakup with Michelle wasn’t an

easy one. They were desperately in love. Both of

them suffered. He wasn’t sleeping well and he was

taking sleep medications, but they weren’t work-

ing. He said, “I’ve got to stop.”

Kate Ledger:He came home the last Christmas. We

watched movies, cooked. He swam every day in

the ocean. After he went back [to London] for

filming, he had a chest infection. I told him, “You

have to be careful mixing [medications]. He

said, “Katie, hello. Come on, of course.” The

night before he passed, we were joking and

laughing because he was threatening to take

our little sister [Ashleigh, 27] to get her nose

pierced, and then he said, “I’ve got to go. I’ll

call you at 8:30 in the morning.” I told him, “I

love you,” and that was it.

Ledger’s death, on Jan. 22, 2008, shocked the world

and crushed his family and friends.

Kate Ledger:I still feel very connected to Heath. I

feel connected to him through his beautiful

daughter Matilda. When Heath was around, she

looked so much like him, we used to say, “It’s

Heath in pigtails.” Now everything she does, the

way she rides a skateboard, reminds me of Heath.

For the first five years every time I saw her, I’d be

in tears, but now I can be happy and feel her dad-

dy’s energy through her.•

April 24, 2017 PEOPLE 49

SAYING GOODBYE

Ledger (in ’06)

“seemed indestructi-

ble,” says his

friend Ben Harper.

Inset: the memorial

outside the apartment

where he died in ’08.

A TALENT TO

TRANSFORM

“Once he committed to a

role, he’d work on

disappearing,” says his

agent, Steve Alexander.

Among Ledger’s star turns:

(from top) 1999’s10 Things

I Hate About You (with Julia

Stiles); 2005’sBrokeback

Mountain (with Jake

Gyllenhaal); and as the

Joker in 2008’sThe Dark

Knight, for which he won

a posthumous Oscar.

Today the Heath Ledger

Scholarship “helps

emerging Australian actors

make their international

career leap,” says his sister

Kate. (For more, go to

australiansinfilm.org.)

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT: SARAH RHODES/NEWSPIX/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK; J. GRAYLOCK/JPI STUDIOS; BIG/BAUER GRIFFIN; FOCUS FEATURES; MP

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