Warner Bros’ Joker: Folie a Deux, directed by Todd Phillips, held its first press conference on September 4 at the Venice Film Festival. The team behind the film is eager to replicate the massive success of its predecessor. Joker, released in 2019, made a significant impact, winning the prestigious Golden Lion at Venice and earning Joaquin Phoenix an Oscar for Best Actor.
During the press conference, Phillips spoke about the challenges of creating the highly anticipated sequel. He admitted that presenting the sequel at the world’s oldest film festival made him more nervous than the first film’s debut. “It’s a lot easier to come into something as an insurgent than it is as the incumbent. There’s definitely a sense of more nervousness with this second one,” Phillips shared.
Phillips also shared that he and Joaquin Phoenix frequently joked on set about whether they could replicate the first film’s impact with the sequel. They often pondered, “Could we create something as unexpected as the original, even though it’s a sequel?” Additionally, Phillips and Phoenix discussed the film’s musical elements, with the director revealing that the musical direction was inspired by a dream Phoenix had.
In the same conversation, Phillips was also asked if the sequel was a response to the critics of the 2019 film, who thought it was embodying and justifying violence as a reaction to masculine, incel aggrievement. To this, the director immediately mentioned that the question was unfair and shared that responding to such critiques was never his goal. He added, “But no, I mean, this movie was not in response to that in any way. Movies are way too hard to make as a statement in response to something.”
Phillips further said, “In 2018, when we first made Joker, we could never have imagined it would strike such a chord with audiences around the world. Joaquin and I had discussed a sequel, but never seriously until we witnessed the reaction to Arthur’s story. If we were going to do it, we knew we had to swing for the fences. We wanted to create something as crazy and fearless as Joker himself. So, Scott Silver and I wrote a script that delved further into the idea of identity. Who is Arthur Fleck? And where does the music inside him come from?”
The director also shared whether he is interested in working with the DC Comics Superhero characters and stories. However, he mentioned that it depends on whether any interesting actors, like Phoenix, are willing to collaborate with him on such a future project. “Everything I do is dictated on atoors. What actor could I work with? Who am I dying to work with, and could I build something around that person? Clearly, these films have been built around Joaquin, then we introduced Gaga. So I can’t really say yes or no, but it’s not necessarily my goal to stay in this space,” the director said.
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