In a dance dedicated to the late Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles reunited with much of the cast of the 1999 film 10 Things I Hate About You during Tuesday night’s episode of Dancing with the Stars.
Stiles told her partner Ezra Sosa that she had always admired his “lust for life” and wanted to replicate that in her contemporary routine, which the pair aptly performed to “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” by Frankie Valli.
Ledger’s Patrick Verona memorably serenades Stiles’ Kat Stratford with the song at the end of the film.
The end of the Dancing with the Stars performance on Tuesday night featured Stiles linking arms with several of her other former cast members including Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Gabrielle Union, Larisa Oleynik, Susan May Pratt, and Andrew Keegan.
In the last few moments of the routine, Sosa leaves Stiles on the dance floor as her monologue from the film played in lieu of music and a still from the film took over the screen at the back of the room. Stiles placed a rose underneath the photo before joining her co-stars.
She scored four 9s on the routine, among the highest of the night. “Watching you, it just makes me want to open my heart,” judge Carrie Ann Inaba told her after the performance.
Ledger died in 2008 from an accidental overdose. Later that year, he received a posthumous Oscar for his performance as the Joker in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight. He and Stiles met on the set of 10 Things I Hate About You, which is a modern retelling of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew. It was Stiles’ first major feature film.