Lady Gaga asked the crew to call her by a different name while shooting Joker 2.
Lady Gaga really wants the world to take her Harley Quinn performance seriously. The musician is joining Joaquin Phoenix for the long-awaited sequel to Joker, with Todd Phillips at the helm once again, in one of the few past projects from the old DCU that will still remain as part of the new universe that James Gunn and Peter Safran are building, although this story won’t belong to the main canon such as The Batman.
Gaga has already proven to be as wonderful actress as she is a singer while participating in movies such as A Star Is Born and House of Gucci, but playing one of DC’s most popular villains/anti-heroes is another kind of challenge for the actress, especially after the type of character development that Phoenix showed in the first film, something that Phillips will probably want to do with Harley in the sequel.
But it seems like Gaga has really taken the task seriously, fully committing to the character. While participating on The Trenches Talk podcast, cinematographer Lawrence Sher revealed the actress was acting really weird towards him on set and even made him call her by an alias:
“I didn’t know Stefani at all. Strangely, I felt like I never even met her, even during the makeup/hair tests. Because again, maybe it was my philosophy of not trying to get in their space. And then I remember for a week, being like, god, I feel like we are disconnecting. Not even connecting. We are like on opposites. And I would say to my crew, ‘Jesus, I can’t, like, crack it. She either hates me or we hate each other. There’s something weird going on here.’ I barely said anything, except I would say, ‘Stefani, this is where your second team was, minor little things,’ and then the AD at one point said, ‘Oh you know, Stef would like if you just called her Lee on set.’ And I was like, oh, 100 percent, and I literally said, the next thing I said, was something ‘Lee,’ and it was like everything changed. From that point on, it was like she was… our whole connection changed. I was like, alright, cool.”
After it was revealed that Joker: Folie á Deux was going to be a musical, the choice of Lady Gaga for Harley Quinn made a lot more of sense to the fans. But after the amazing performance of the character that Margot Robbie has offered in the past few years, the singer will have some large shoes to fill.
Harley Quinn was first introduced back in 1992 in Batman: The Animated Series as the main love interest for the Joker. Harleen Frances Quinzel, her original name, was a doctor at Arkham Asylum who falls in love with the dangerous villain and ends up becoming his ally.
The movie is reportedly following a similar story, but with Harley as another patient at the iconic Gotham City mental hospital where she meets Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck. The title of the movie, Folie á Deux refers to a psychological disorder that two or more people share due to their close relationship.
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