Joker: Folie a Deux

Front Row at the Movies by Shirrel Rhoades

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The Joker is a supervillain character created for DC Comic by Gil Kane, Bill Finger, and Jerry Robinson. He was conceived as a crazed archenemy for Batman. His ghastly appearance – white face, green hair, and rictus grin – was inspired by the Joker playing card and by actor Conrad Veidt in the 1928 film “The Man Who Laughs.”

His early comic book appearances presented him as a psychopath, but with the advent of the Comic Code he morphed into more of a trickster.

On TV, the Joker was portrayed as a cackling prankster by Cesar Romero. In the movies, he has been played by an overexuberant Jack Nicholson, a disturbed Heath Ledger, and more recently by a clearly deranged Joaquin Phoenix.

In “Joker” (2019), Phoenix gave us Arthur Fleck, “a failed clown and aspiring stand-up comedian whose descent into mental illness and nihilism inspires a violent countercultural revolution against the wealthy in a decaying Gotham City.”

As directed by Todd Phillips, the film was described as a “psychological thriller” rather than a superhero movie.

Phoenix won an Academy Award for the role (as Heath Ledger did too).

Now Joaquin Phoenix returns in a sequel, “Joker: Folie à Deux.”

Although “Joker” was supposed to be a standalone film, both Phoenix and Phillips expressed interest in making a follow-up. “I can’t stop thinking about it … if there’s something else, we can do with Joker that might be interesting,” said Phoenix. “Because it seemed endless, the possibilities of where we can go with the character.”

After abandoning the idea of doing a Broadway musical when COVID-19 hit, Phillips and Phoenix decided to pursue a movie version that combined “music, dance, drama, courtroom drama, comedy, happiness and sadness and a traditional love story.”

Based on the original film’s billion-dollar box-office success, Warner Bros. (parent company of DC Comics) was more than willing to go along with them.

Thanks to the reception that the Joker’s dancing down the West 167th Street Step Stairs to the tune of “Rock and Roll Part 2” got in the first movie, that element has been expanded this time around. The new film – now screening in theaters – is described as a “musical psychological thriller.”

“Joker: Folie à Deux” finds Arthur Fleck aka the Joker locked away in Arkham State Hospital, a repository for the criminal insane. Here, he falls in love with a fellow inmate, Harleen “Lee” Quinzel.

As comic book fanboys know, this is the street name of that daffy supervillain Harley Quinn.

Phoenix envisioned pairing Arthur with a “female Joker” as his dance partner as a way to produce “a kind of psychotic tango.”

In comic book tellings, Harleen Quinzel was a doctor at the asylum. For this film version, she has been demoted to one of the imprisoned nut jobs.
But not to worry, being played by Lady Gaga, Harley Quinn gets lots of screen time to match Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker.

A good cast, the film also features Catherine Keener as Arthur’s lawyer, Brendan Gleeson as a guard at Arkham, Zazie Beetz reprising her role as Arthur’s imagined love interest, and Harry Lawtey as Harvey Dent, the DA who plans to prosecute Arthur for his crimes. Sharon Washington returns as Arthur’s social worker. And Steve Coogan makes an appearance as a TV personality who interviews Arthur.

Phillips says he wanted to explore the crossover between news and entertainment. He found it “sad and troubling how entertainment has been corrupted to the point where the Depp v. Heard trial or Donald Trump’s presidential debates have been treated as entertainment.”

Phillips’s goal for the film was to make it feel like it had been produced by “crazy people,” but struggled with making it as a “musical,” because the film lacks traditional musical numbers, and most of the music contains dialogue.

As a result, Phillips did not require Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga to sing professionally, seeking a “rawer, more unstable sound that fluctuated between euphoria and despair,” one which occasionally required singing off-key.

Lady Gaga says, “It was unlike anything I’ve ever done before. I’m a trained singer, right? So even my breathing was different when I sang as Lee. When I breathe to sing on stage, I have this very controlled way to make sure that I’m on pitch and it’s sustained at the right rhythm and amount of time, but Lee would never know how to do any of that. So, it’s like removing the technicality of the whole thing, removing my perceived art-form from it all and completely being inside of who she is.” – i.e., crazy.

Email Shirrel: srhoades@aol.com