Todd Phillps Says Joker Movie Won’t Follow Anything From The Comics

July 8, 2019

Todd Phillps Says Joker Movie Won’t Follow Anything From The Comics

In an interview with Empire, director Todd Phillips has revealed that Warner Bros. Pictures’ upcoming Joker movie will be a completely new take on the origin story of the iconic titular Batman villain and will not be featuring any storylines from the comics.

“We didn’t follow anything from the comic-books, which people are gonna be mad about. We just wrote our own version of where a guy like Joker might come from. That’s what was interesting to me. We’re not even doing Joker, but the story of becoming Joker. It’s about this man.”

He also revealed that Joaquin Phoenix was already the first choice for the role ever since the start of the film’s pre-production. “We had a photo of him above our computer while we were writing. We constantly thought, ‘God, imagine if Joaquin actually does this.’”

Joker stars Joaquin Phoenix as the titular villain plus Zazie Beetz (Deadpool 2), Bill Camp (Red Sparrow, Molly’s Game), Frances Conroy (American Horror Story, Castle Rock), Brett Cullen (42, Narcos), Glenn Fleshler (Billions, Barry), Douglas Hodge (Red Sparrow, Penny Dreadful), Marc Maron (Maron, GLOW), Josh Pais (Motherless Brooklyn, Going in Style), and Shea Whigham (First Man, Kong: Skull Island).

Joker centers around the iconic arch nemesis and is an original, standalone story not seen before on the big screen. Phillips’ exploration of Arthur Fleck (Phoenix), a man disregarded by society, is not only a gritty character study but also a broader cautionary tale.

Todd Phillips (The Hangover trilogy) directs from a screenplay he co-wrote with writer Scott Silver (The Fighter), based on characters from DC. The film is being produced by Phillips and Bradley Cooper under their Joint Effort banner, and Emma Tillinger Koskoff. It is executive produced by Richard Baratta, Joseph Garner, and Bruce Berman.

Catch up on 75 years of The Joker in comics history here.

Joker debuts in theaters on October 4.

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