10 The Clown Prince Goes Gaga
WHY THE JOKER’S RETURN GIVES US REASONS TO SMILE
JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX
OUT 4 OCTOBER
Double trouble: Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix.
EVERYBODY’S BACK
Joker felt like a true one-off. Todd Phillips’ Scorsese-inflected psychological drama was pitched as a standalone film, as seemed to be the case until it was nominated for 11 Oscars, winning two, and making over $1 billion. The Joker crew were maniacally laughing all the way to the bank. And now, perhaps inevitably, they’re back. All of them: Phillips back in the chair, co-writer Scott Silver back at the keyboard, Joaquin Phoenix back under the face-paint, cinematographer Lawrence Sher back behind the lens, and composer Hildur Guðnadóttir back at the cello. Even before the box-office haul, though, Phoenix said that he couldn’t stop thinking about the character, and what he could do with him again. As Irving Berlin once wrote, there may be trouble ahead… Let’s face the music, and dance. Speaking of which…