Published September 7, 2006
Metronews.ca
Candy's Close to Ledger's Heart

Film shoot takes actor back to his native Australia


Heath Ledger is very happy that Oscar is, at least momentarily, in his past.

The Australian actor, nominated for an Academy Award this year for his performance in the critically-acclaimed Brokeback Mountain, has returned to the Toronto International Film Festival with a decidedly different film and half the pressure.

In Candy, Ledger plays Dan, a poet and junkie consumed by a heroin addiction and an overpowering love for his girlfriend (Abbie Cornish). When their mutual addiction becomes too much to bear, the two must decide whether to stay together or split to survive.

“It’s long and tedious and you realize how much — if you really wanted it — you have to work for it, and how much it’s not about you but about them,” Ledger says of the Oscar race.

“That part of the experience is dull, but on the flip side we got to meet all these wonderful people we admired and all these actors and directors we admired and we all turned up to the same events,” Ledger adds.

But the pre-awards season press also means a barrage of questions from like-minded journalists and, inevitably, the same questions repeated endlessly.

“I understand it’s equally frustrating for the person asking the question because they know it’s been asked a million times. It’s like if you’re being asked what your favourite colour is over and over again and the answer’s green or whatever, you’re so tempted to say red or yellow sometimes just to spice it up.”

If the 27-year-old seems relieved not to be discussing Brokeback despite being humbled by the attention, it’s also because Candy, set in Melbourne and Sydney, Australia, allowed him to return home to shoot — a repatriation Ledger dearly looks forward to whenever the opportunity arises.

“This is the first film in eight years I didn’t have to use an accent,” he points out. “I could use my own accent. It was one less thing to really think about. What’s great about it is feeling completely free to ad-lib.”

Candy, directed by fellow Australian Neil Armfield (Twelfth Night) and based on a novel by Luke Davies, delves deep into the hard side of addiction and the difficulty of recovery.

Ledger admits his research for the part — particularly scenes in which his character attempts to stop using heroin — was drawn mainly from Davies’ work, and, somewhat curiously, what he’s seen in various media.

“I kind of feel like over the years, whether it’s books, magazines, television, I kind of feel we all know what it looks like or how it’s been portrayed or how people describe it,” he says of the comedown from heroin. “I guess it’s a good thing. It’s very ugly.” Candy made its North American premiere at TIFF on Friday (08 Sept).

CHRIS ATCHISON/Metro Toronto