Los Angeles (E! Online) - On a day like this two years ago, Heath Ledger was an Oscar nominee. On Tuesday, the 28-year-old leading man was found dead in a Manhattan apartment, possibly due to a drug overdose.
Ledger was last seen alive around noon, according to the New York Police Department. His body was discovered about 3:30 p.m. ET by a housekeeper who went to tell the actor that his masseuse had arrived for an afternoon appointment.
An NYPD spokesperson tell E! News the actor was in bed, surrounded by pills.
Police said that Ledger had been living in the apartment, which was owned by Mary-Kate Olsen.
Ledger, whose tutelage as a Hollywood star came as he worked alongside the likes of Mel Gibson and Billy Bob Thornton, is a star in this coming summers new Batman movie, The Dark Knight. Ledger plays the Joker to Christian Bales Caped Crusader.
In 2006, Ledger earned what would be his first and last Oscar nomination for playing the emotionally tormented gay rancher in Ang Lees breakthrough drama, Brokeback Mountain.
Other key credits included: The Patriot, the 2000 Revolutionary War epic in which he played Gibsons son; 10 Things I Hate About You, the 1998 teen-skewed version of Shakespeares The Taming of the Shrew that made stars of him and Julia Stiles; and, Monsters Ball, the raw 2001 drama in which he played Thorntons jail-warden son, who in a shocking moment, kills himself.
With Brokeback costar Michelle Williams, the Australian-born Ledger was the father of a daughter, Matilda Rose, now 2. Ledger and Williams, who were together for about three years, ended their romantic relationship last year.
Before connecting with Williams, Ledger had a long relationship with Naomi Watts.
Breaking news. More to come.
(Originally published Jan. 22, 2008 at 2:04 p.m. PT.)
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