Maggie Gyllenhaal ‘Lost It’ When She Saw Jake Gyllenhaal’s ‘Brokeback Mountain’ Scene: ‘What Has He Done?’
Jake Gyllenhaal once starred in the critically acclaimed Brokeback Mountain, which worried his sister Maggie Gyllenhaal. If only because there was a scene in the Ang Lee feature that Maggie was uncomfortable watching.
Maggie Gyllenhaal ‘really lost it’ when she saw Jake Gyllenhaal in ‘Brokeback Mountain’
Gyllenhaal didn’t have any qualms about doing Brokeback Mountain. Because of its themes, the film might have risked causing a bit of controversy in the era of the mid-2000s. Gyllenhaal was prepared to face some of the film’s challenges. To an extent.
“I knew it would be a difficult film to make, and something that would put people off, but I didn’t know how difficult it would be to get made. My closest family members, my godfathers, were a gay couple, so it was something I just inherently had no prejudice about,” he said in a 2015 interview with Out.
In an interview with The Sunday Times, Gyllenhaal once again reflected on the importance of Brokeback Mountain. And how some even questioned Gyllenhaal taking part in the film.
“Part of the medicine of storytelling is that we were two straight guys playing these parts,” Gyllenhaal said in an interview with The Sunday Times (IndieWire). “There was a stigma about playing a part like that, you know, why would you do that? And I think it was very important to both of us to break that stigma.”
Gyllenhaal’s sister, Maggie Gyllenhaal, found it especially difficult watching her brother in the role. However, her concerns were based more on Gyllenhaal’s physical safety. Brokeback featured a scene where Gyllenhaal’s character was brutally assaulted, and Maggie couldn’t stand watching her flesh and blood in that position.
“I really lost it when they show him getting beaten up,” she once told People (via FemaleFirst). “He’s my brother so maybe I felt it even more acutely. I thought, ‘Why hurt him? What has he done?’”
Jake Gyllenhaal was told he’d only be cast in ‘Brokeback Mountain’ if Heath Ledger did the film after an awkward meeting
Gyllenhaal and the late Heath Ledger both delivered what many consider memorable performances in the 2005 feature.
The film saw Ledger and Gyllenhaal as cowboys throughout the decades embroiled in a tumultuous and complicated relationship. It was recognized for several accolades, and Gyllenhaal was even nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his work in the film.
It was a project that Gyllenhaal orbited around for years, even before it was Lee’s project to direct.
“I’d actually met with another director, who was attached to it maybe four years before Ang came along. I was probably 19 years old,” Gyllenhaal said.
When Lee was brought on board to do the project, the Hulk director didn’t have Gyllenhaal set in stone for the film. There were several other actors that Lee considered for the cowboy lovers.
“When I first met with Ang there were a number of different combinations of actors he had in mind–and each combination of actors was different. None stayed the same. You would hear, ‘Oh, this person and that person, or not them at all.’ Or ‘this person and that person,’ and then ‘not them at all,’” Gyllenhaal said.
Gyllenhaal was soon told that being cast in the film might have depended on what Ledger wanted to do.
“After I had met with Ang–a brief, somewhat awkward meeting–I heard, ‘Now he’s thinking about Heath Ledger and you. But if Heath doesn’t want to do it, then it’s going to be somebody else,’” Gyllenhaal recalled.
Jake Gyllenhaal once shared Heath Ledger couldn’t stand jokes about ‘Brokeback Mountain’
Gyllenhaal opened up about Ledger’s sensitivities to the subject matter Brokeback tackled. The film meant so much to Ledger that he refused to allow jokes being made at the movie’s expense. This was why Ledger vetoed an Oscars gag that that centered around the flick.
“I mean, I remember they wanted to do an opening for the Academy Awards that year that was sort of joking about it,” Gyllenhaal said in an interview with Another Man. “And Heath refused. I was sort of at the time, ‘Oh, okay… whatever.’ I’m always like, ‘It’s all in good fun.’ And Heath said, ‘It’s not a joke to me – I don’t want to make any jokes about it.’”
