By Chris Snellgrove | Published
A long time ago Folie and Deux making history as one of the greatest superhero films in Hollywood history, Joaquin Phoenix impressed us all with his debut The Joker the movie. The film grossed over a billion dollars at the box office and helped its star take home an Academy Award for Best Actor, leading many to wonder why Warner Bros. who did not include this famous actor in the making of the actor before. As it turns out, they almost did: Joaquin Phoenix has openly spoken to star director Christopher Nolan about playing the Joker The Dark Knight but he was not ready to play a famous criminal.
Joaquin Phoenix Could Play The Joker In The Dark Knight
This shocking revelation came at a time when the star was just emerging The Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin. During an interview, Joaquin Phoenix revealed that he doesn’t remember exactly why he didn’t play the Joker… he said, “I remember talking to Chris Nolan about The Dark Knight and that didn’t happen for any reason.” While elaborating on his involvement with Nolan, Phoenix summed things up with a simple statement: “I wasn’t ready at the time.”
During the interview, Joaquin Phoenix was equally accurate in assessing why he wasn’t ready to play the Joker in the 2008 blockbuster: “That’s one of those things where it’s like, ‘Why am I not doing this? ” he asked. Sounding cryptic, he noted that “it’s not about me” and concluded that “there’s something else” that has kept him from embracing the iconic villain over the years.
Praise For Heath Ledger
Finally, Joaquin Phoenix answered his own question by addressing the elephant in the room: namely, that Heath Ledger finally portrayed the Joker The Dark Knight and gave what would be (literally, sadly) the performance of a lifetime. It might be beneficial in hindsight, but Phoenix thought that the reason why he hesitated to reveal this villain, saying, “Someone else will do something.” He then said what he had been thinking all along: “I can’t imagine what it would have been like if we didn’t have Heath Ledger in that movie.”
Lest anyone think he was suggested he should have gotten the role instead of Ledger (who won an Academy Award for Best Actor), Phoenix clarified that his memory was so vague that he wasn’t sure Nolan wanted to cast him in the role. “I don’t know if Christopher Nolan would come to me and say, ‘You’re definitely human,'” he admitted. Noting his certainty that they had at least met to discuss the film and the role, Phoenix revealed that the director may have had his doubts: “My feeling was that I shouldn’t be doing this, but maybe he was saying, ‘He’s not. boy.’”
The Right Time
Because he’s obviously as talented as Joaquin Phoenix (he again he took home the Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of the Joker), we can’t help but be glad he didn’t play Batman’s nemesis The Dark Knight. Ledger’s Clown Prince was successful because he was everything Joker’s Joker was not: bold, theatrical, and irreverently controversial. Assuming Phoenix had landed the role and the script had not changed, we would have gotten the worst of both worlds…a performance that is a pale shadow of Ledger’s career in both countries. The Dark Knight again Phoenix will work later The Joker.
And, given the massive failure of The Joker 2 compared to the Oscar-winning, billion-dollar success of the first film, it might be time for us all to admit something that doesn’t feel right: first. The Joker the film was a success, its success speaks to how young audiences were ready for it Taxi driver makeover with star in clown makeup. Joaquin Phoenix is an amazing talent and his first performance as the Joker remains iconic, but the failure of the sequel proves how little talent is when the script is so bad. The title was quite accurate, as this was a folie a deux…a folly shared by both Phoenix and Phillips.
Source: Variety
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