10 Movie Scenes Changed After The Actor Died

Terry Gilliam's fantasy film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus suffered a seemingly production-ending blow when star Heath Ledger died suddenly in January 2008, less than two months into a near-five month shoot.

However, the film's dreamlike nature at least gave Gilliam an out, that he could contrive a way for Ledger's protagonist, Tony, to change his appearance as he travels through the movie's dream world and it wouldn't seem totally out of place.

And so, while the spine of the narrative remained mostly in tact, Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law were brought aboard to portray three separate transformations of Tony throughout the remainder of the yet-to-be-filmed scenes.

Though there's an undeniable messiness to the overall narrative, the transition from one actor to the next is impressively seamless and, accepting Gilliam's surreal tendencies as a filmmaker, feels like it was always part of the plan.