Will Ledger's last role get U.S. play?

Backstage at the Oscars on Sunday night, Kate Ledger told reporters that her family is very much in the loop on her brother's final movie.

"We've seen a little bit of the footage," she said of Terry Gilliam's "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus," Ledger's last film. "I think it's going to be amazing."

But the comments only highlighted a larger question: When will U.S. audiences get to see it?

The head-trippy "Parnassus," about a traveling magician who gives customers more than they bargained for, is a joint production of financing entity Grosvenor Park and sales mogul Samuel Hadida of Davis Films. It was gliding along as just another independently financed production -- and product of Gilliam's funhouse imagination -- when Ledger died early last year right in the middle of production.

In a now-famous turn, the project's fate was thrown into question until Jude Law, Colin Farrell and Johnny Depp stepped in, with all three part of an elaborate workaround that has the actors playing different parts of Ledger's role.

That saved the production for the time being. But the sales process since then has been nearly as elaborate -- and complicated. (more)