Jake Gyllenhaal In "Proof", featuring Gwyneth Paltrow and Anthony Hopkins, Gyllenhaal played a graduate student in mathematics who tries to convince Paltrow's character to publish a revolutionary proof to a problem puzzling the mathematicians' community. In "Jarhead", Gyllenhaal played a violent U.S. Marine during the first Gulf War. He also auditioned to be Batman for the blockbuster "Batman Begins" and came close to getting the role, but Christian Bale was ultimately chosen for it. In "Brokeback Mountain", Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger play young men who meet as sheep herders and embark upon a sexual relationship that begins in the summer of 1963
Heath Ledger death. While working on the film in London, Ledger told Sarah Lyall in their "New York Times" interview that he viewed "The Dark Knight"s Joker as a "psychopathic, mass murdering, schizophrenic clown with zero empathy". For his work on "The Dark Knight", Ledger posthumously won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, which his family accepted on his behalf, as well as numerous other posthumous awards, including the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor, which Christopher Nolan accepted for him. At the time of his death on 22 January 2008, Ledger had completed about half of the work for