The hit movie Brokeback Mountain serves to give both Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal two of their most memorable roles, and one can’t help but wonder it would have turned out if the original casting choices had stayed on board. Reflecting on the near-casting in a new interview, Josh Hartnett says he was attached to star as one of the two leads at one point alongside Joaquin Phoenix. As Hartnett explains, he had to pull out because of a scheduling conflict, and he now regrets missing his chance to kiss the Oscar-winning Joker star.
Hartnett doesn’t reveal which of the two main characters in Brokeback Mountain he’d been cast as, so it’s unclear if he’d be playing Ledger’s Ennis Del Mar of Gyllenhaal’s Jack Twist. In the movie, Ledger and Gyllenhaal play two cowboys who fall in love in 1963 Wyoming, meeting up back at their old spot at Brokeback Mountain as the years go by. Tensions brew with one of the two desperate to be open with their relationship so they can live out the rest of their days together while the other insists on keeping the affair private.
“Unfortunately, I was going to do Brokeback Mountain. And I had a contract with Black Dahlia that I had to film, so I had to drop out of it. It was a different film altogether, it was me and Joaquin Phoenix. But they went on to do it with Heath (Ledger) and Jake (Gyllenhaal). I’ve always wanted to kiss Joaquin, so that’s my biggest regret."
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Written by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, Brokeback Mountain is based on the short story by Annie Proulx and directed by Ang Lee. It was a big hit when it was released in 2005, drawing universal acclaim from critics and grossing $178 million against a budget of $14 million. Brokeback Mountain was also an award season sensation with a Best Picture nomination along with Oscar wins for Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor for Gyllenhaal; Ledger was nominated for Best Actor.
Jake Gyllenhaal later said in a 2019 interview with Today that Brokeback Mountain opened a lot of doors for him with his acting career. He described how mind-blowing it was to be 26 years old and at the Academy Awards because of his performance in the movie, which by that point, had become “much bigger” than him. Gyllenhaal also touched on the people who’ve joked about his role by quoting his lines from Brokeback Mountain, which just made him appreciate Heath Ledger that much more, as the late actor always took the movie very seriously.
“That’s the thing I loved about Heath, was he would never joke. Someone wanted to make a joke about the story, and he said, ‘No. This is about love,’” Gyllenhaal recalled.
Josh Hartnett’s The Black Dahlia did not share the same levels of success as Brokeback Mountain, coming up short with critics and at the box office, though it was nominated for a Best Cinematography Oscar. The actor picked up memorable roles soon after in movies like Lucky Number Slevin and 30 Days of Night. More recently, he’s appeared in titles like Valley of the Gods, Wrath of Man, and Ida Red, and will next appear in Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre. You can read the full interview with Hartnet at News.com.au.
