Joker: Folie à Deux director Todd Phillips has revealed that scenes from the film were “very often” re-written in Joaquin Phoenix’s trailer at the last minute.
The follow up to 2019’s Joker, which is out in cinemas on October 4, received its premiere at the 81st Venice International Film Festival this week (September 4), with some of the early reactions hailing it as the “movie of the year”.
And now, in an interview with Variety, Phillips has revealed that he, Phoenix and co-star Lady Gaga would often sit in the actor’s trailer on the day of a scene’s filming and tear it apart and write a new one.
Confirming a story Gaga had previously told Vanity Fair, Phillips said: “My line about Joaquin is that he’s the tunnel at the end of the light. You think, ‘Okay, this scene works, let’s just go shoot it.’ And Joaquin’s like, ‘No, no, no, let’s just have a quick meeting about it,’ and it’s three hours later and you’re rewriting it on a napkin.”
The director went on to heap praise on Gaga, highlighting her confidence in acting, despite her relative inexperience. “What’s great about Lady Gaga is that she really holds her own, both off camera when we’re in the trailer tearing things apart — which she probably spent the night before learning — but also on camera. It was not a small feat.”
The most recent clip of the film to have been officially shared showed Gaga – who plays Harleen ‘Lee’ Quinzel, aka Harley Quinn, in the film – singing ‘Get Happy’ from the 1950 Judy Garland film Summer Stock alongside Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck, aka the Joker.
Phillips made the unconventional decision to make the sequel a musical, which Gaga has hailed as “a very big swing”, praising the film’s “audacity and complexity”.
In a four-star review of Folie à Deux, NME wrote: “As with the original movie, the film looks gorgeous throughout, with cinematographer Lawrence Sher making strong use of colour and conjuring up some beautiful images – highlights include an overhead shot of some umbrellas (referencing Jacques Demy’s 1964 musical The Umbrellas Of Cherbourg) and a stunningly lit frame of Arthur lighting a cigarette in his prison cell that resembles a lovingly illustrated comic book panel.
“In short, Phillips and Silver have delivered the last thing anyone expected: a socially responsible Joker movie that finds an intriguing way to explore the consequences (both on and offscreen) of the first film. Joker fans shouldn’t cry too hard though – Warner Bros. have cleverly found a way to leave the door open a little for the franchise to continue, should the need arise.”
Last month, director Todd Phillips suggested that Folie à Deux will be the final film in his Joker franchise: “It was fun to play in this sort of sandbox for two movies, but I think we’ve said what we wanted to say in this world.”
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