Lady Gaga has opened up about her struggle with letting her character Harley Quinn from Joker: Folie A Deux go.
The pop star appeared alongside her co-star Joaquin Phoenix on the red carpet in London for the UK premiere of the film earlier this week. While on the carpet, the ‘Just Dance’ singer took a moment to speak with Sky News about why she was having a hard time giving up her character.
“I don’t really know if I did because I’ve made a whole record about her,” Gaga explained, referring to the film’s companion LP ‘Harlequin‘ which was released today (September 27).
Joker: Folie à Deux has been referred to as a jukebox musical, with covers of a number of jazz standards including ‘Oh, When The Saints’, ‘Get Happy’ and ‘That’s Life’, along with a few original tracks, which all feature on ‘Harlequin’.
Speaking to Sky News about the creation of the LP, Gaga said: “I think the whole experience inspired me through and through. It was so amazing to get to know this character through music, through the script, through dance, through all this tremendous collaboration.”
In an interview with Vogue earlier this month, Gaga said that she drew on her own experiences when playing the character: “Harley Quinn is a character people know from the ether of pop culture. I had a different experience creating her, namely my experience with mania and chaos inside – for me, it creates a quietness. Sometimes women are labelled as these overly emotional creatures and when we are overwhelmed we are erratic or unhinged. But I wonder if when things become so broken from reality, when we get pushed too far in life, what if it makes you…quiet?”
She continued: “I would say that I worked from a sense-memory perspective: What does it feel like to walk through the world and be…braced, in an intense way. And what happens when you cover up all of the complexities beneath the surface?”
NME gave Joker: Folie à Deux a four-star review, saying that Gaga “shines in a provocative prison musical” and: “[director Todd] Phillips and [co-writer Scott] Silver have delivered the last thing anyone expected: a socially responsible Joker movie that finds an intriguing way to explore the consequences (both on and offscreen) of the first film. Joker fans shouldn’t cry too hard though – Warner Bros. have cleverly found a way to leave the door open a little for the franchise to continue, should the need arise.“
‘Harlequin’ marked Gaga’s first LP since 2021’s ‘Love For Sale’, a collaborative album with the late Tony Bennett. Prior to that, her last solo studio album was 2020’s ‘Chromatica’. She’s previously revealed plans to release a new album of original material in 2025, describing it as LG7 – her seventh album – as opposed to ‘Harlequin’, which she’s calling LG6.5.
Following the UK premiere of the film, Gaga hosted a secret intimate ‘Harlequin‘ listening party in London, where she played the album in full, whilst singing and dancing with the crowd of die hard fans.
Last month, Joker director Todd Phillips suggested that Folie à Deux is likely to be the final film in the Joker franchise: “It was fun to play in this sort of sandbox for two movies, but I think we’ve said what we wanted to say in this world.”
