Culture

Joker 2: Fans go wild over new footage of Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn

By Sam Damshenas

27th March 2023

Following new footage from the forthcoming Joker sequel, Monsters are hailing Lady Gaga’s role as Harley Quinn as a “win for the gays”.

Over the weekend, clips of the star filming the upcoming blockbuster – titled Folie à Deux – went viral on the internet.

In character, Gaga can be seen walking up the stairs of the New York County Supreme Court before landing a surprise kiss on an unknown female bystander, who is holding a newspaper with pictures of Harley Quinn on the front page alongside the headline, “Crazy in Love”.

The title character’s face is also on the newspaper with a smaller headline reading, “Joker has a new love”. Joaquin Phoenix was also spotted on set as the Joker/Arthur Fleck.

According to social media detectives, the bystander shouts “you’re going to hell” before Gaga lands the kiss and tells her, “Now we are both going to hell.”

“Oh she’s coming for that Oscar,” tweeted one excited fan, while another wrote: “WE’RE GETTING BI HARLEY ON THE BIG SCREEN AND SHE’S GAGA LETS GO.”

Gaga’s involvement with Joker: Folie à Deux, which will reportedly be a full-blown musical, was confirmed in June 2022.

The pop icon earned widespread critical acclaim for her performances in A Star is Born (2018) and House of Gucci (2021), for which she respectively received Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations.

Margot Robbie memorably played Harley Quinn in the DC Extended Universe films Suicide Squad (2016), Birds of Prey (2020) and The Suicide Squad (2021).

Robbie gave Gaga her blessing in an interview with MTV News, saying she will be “incredible” as the fan-favourite anti-hero.

“It’s such an honour to have built a foundation strong enough that Harley can now be one of those characters that other actors get to have a go at playing,” she explained.

“It makes me so happy because, I said from the very beginning is, all I want is for Harley Quinn to be one of those characters, the way, like, Macbeth or Batman always gets passed, you know, from great actor to great actor.”

Todd Phillips, director, recently debuted the first look at Gaga as Harley Quinn in an intimate – and passionate – moment with the Joker.

Joker: Folie à Deux, which means “shared madness” in French, is presumably set to take place after the events of the first film, which made history as the first R-rated flick to gross $1 billion at the box office. 

While it received mixed-to-positive reviews, Joker received 11 nominations at the 92nd Academy Awards – with Phoenix winning Best Actor.

Phillips returns for the sequel with a screenplay co-written with Scott Silver.

Zazie Beetz also reprises her role as Arthur’s love interest Sophie Dumond, with Brendan Gleeson, Catherine Keener, Jacob Lofland and Harry Lawtey cast in undisclosed roles.

Joker: Folie à Deux is scheduled to be released on 4 October 2024.