heath ledger drug tape

An American television entertainment show has ditched plans to air a video showing actor Heath Ledger talking about drug use at an alleged Hollywood drug party.

After earlier promoting the video, Entertainment Tonight (ET) now says it will not show the explosive footage out of respect for Ledger's family.

ET said Australia's Nine Network had obtained the tape and was preparing to show it in Australia - something that Nine denied.

Nine spokeswoman Alex Phillips said the network did not have possession of the tape.

"We are not showing the video because we don't have the tape," Ms Phillips said.

Ledger was found dead from a suspected prescription drug overdose in his New York apartment last Wednesday, aged 28.

His family is now preparing to farewell him at a funeral, expected to be held in Perth in the next few days.

In its promotion for the story, ET showed excerpts of the video, in which Ledger can be heard saying: "I used to smoke five joints a day for 20 years."

Excerpts from the video were shown widely on Australian TV on Thursday.

The video was allegedly made two years ago at the hotel where actor John Belushi died - the Chateau Marmont, in Hollywood - while Ledger's girlfriend Michelle Williams and his daughter Matilda Rose were upstairs.

Ledger is not shown taking drugs, although others can be seen in grainy footage apparently snorting a substance off a table.

"I'm going to get serious shit from my girlfriend," Ledger is heard saying.

Asked by someone why, he says: "We had a baby three months ago."

He goes on to tell the person his daughter's name, and then says: "I shouldn't be here at all".

Entertainment Tonight said the "disturbing" video would make headlines around the world.

But in a statement on its website, ET said it was pulling the story.

"Out of respect for Heath Ledger's family, Entertainment Tonight and The Insider have decided not to run the Heath Ledger video which has been circulating in the world media," the statement said.

Earlier, Ledger's US publicist described as "heinous" and "inaccurate" a tabloid report that Michelle Williams attempted to drop Ledger off at a Malibu drug rehab centre in 2006.

The story, in Us Weekly magazine and quoting "a Ledger confidant", alleged Ledger used cocaine, heroin and "a variety of pills".

The magazine alleged that just weeks after Ledger and Williams walked the red carpet as nominees at the 2006 Oscars for Brokeback Mountain, Williams drove Ledger to Promises Treatment Centre in Malibu.

Ledger refused to check in, swaying her instead with a pledge to clean up, according to the report.

heath ledger drug tape

New York-based publicist Mara Buxbaum, who represents both Ledger and Williams, hit out at the Us Weekly report and other tabloid stories about Ledger's death.

"Much of the tabloid reporting is inaccurate," Buxbaum said in a statement.

"This fabricated story of Michelle Williams attempting to bring Heath Ledger to rehab is just one lie among many.

"The speculation is heinous.

"Let this family grieve privately."

death

Ang Lee had called him a “young Brando.” John Travolta called him “my actor.” Tributes poured in from Hollywood as the Australian prime minister mourned the loss of a deeply talented native son and the White House postponed an event that might have been construed as exploiting Heath Ledger’s death likely caused by an accidental prescription drug overdose.

I can’t think of an actor whose death has affected me so deeply. Last Tuesday was one of those moments that reminds you that there is no reason or logic in the cosmos, merely bright and beautiful stars interspersed with dark matter that eventually burn themselves out.

I was not the most ardent fan; I saw only three of Ledger’s films. But I found his performance as Ennis Del Mar in the epic Brokeback Mountain — a study in quiet, lonely, dignified, protracted pain soothed intermittently by sublime moments of intimacy — was as soaring as the film’s Santaolalla soundtrack. Some criticized the film for lack of realism — the initial physical episode between Ennis and Jack was indeed implausibly executed — but the performances rang true. They stuck in your head, made you think and feel.

It was a film that made many uncomfortable. In January 2006, Boston Globe columnist Alex Beam noted that the it wasn’t meeting box office predictions because “[f]irst and foremost, outside of major cities, many Americans remain jittery at best and disapproving at worst of homosexuality.” (Never mind that Brokeback had just been named Best Picture by the Iowa Film Critics Society.) I myself never saw it in a theater. My film-buff son almost always selects our viewing fare, and at 15 at the time he didn’t suggest this one. I rented the DVD when it came out and he watched it before I had a chance to do so.

“It’s not a ‘gay cowboy’ film,” he announced matter of factly. “It’s a love story.” I watched it with him and my then-teenage daughter, all of us blown away by its intensity and courage.

heath ledger on youtube

heath ledger tape

Two of America’s top entertainment shows have caused controversy after buying a video of Heath Ledger at a Hollywood drug party.

how did heath ledger die?

They have shown part of the tape, but decided against the rest of it following a public outcry.

The video, which was taken two years ago, seems to show drugs being taken and Heath drinking.

Hollywood gossip programmes were about to make it public after reportedly paying more than $200,000 for the tape, until Ledger’s American PR firm started an e-mail campaign to have the video pulled, calling it a “shameful exploitation of the lowest kind.”

Late today, it was announced that the video would not be shown out of respect for the actor and his family.

Ledger’s family has already had to deal with news of a scam artist posing as his father, Kim.

The con-artist tricked Tom Cruise, conned doctors and funeral home staff and tried to get John Travolta to buy him plane tickets.

And when people found heath ledger drug tape they say WOW!!

heath ledger video

The footage is understood to have been shot two years ago at Los Angeles celebrity hangout Chateau Marmont at a January 29 (2006) party following the Screen Actors Guild awards - where Ledger had missed out on two awards for Brokeback Mountain despite being favourite in both categories.

Ledger had appeared at the ceremony alongside his girlfriend Michelle Williams but she did not attend the private party and was reportedly sleeping in a room upstairs with the couple's daughter Matilda.

The footage, which was taken through a window into a hotel room, showed Ledger talking and shows at least one guest sniffing a "cocaine-like" substance off a drug-filled table with a rolled up bill in his hand. At one stage, Ledger's face is noticeably twitching as he speaks.