Ledger was planning Drake film

Actor Heath Ledger was planning to make a film about the life of Nick Drake, the Midlands singer and songwriter who died in strikingly similar circumstances to the Brokeback Mountain star, it has been revealed.

Ledger was found dead last week in his New York apartment surrounded by prescription pills. It is believed he died from an overdose although it is not yet known whether it was deliberate or accidental.

It has now emerged that the 28-year-old star was planning a film biography of Drake, the brother of Shropshire actress Gabrielle Drake.

Oscar-nominee Ledger made an amateur video for the last song Drake wrote before, according to a Warwickshire coroner, the singer killed himself aged 26 with anti-depressant pills in 1974.