Warner Bros. Brings 'Joker: Folie à Deux' Teaser Trailer To CinemaCon
DC Studios’s first elseworld film has exhibited tendencies to break out chaotically
It’s a very light year theatrically for DC Studios, but that doesn’t mean Warner Bros. was going to leave it behind for their CinemaCon presentation in Las Vegas. That included their Sundance pickup of the documentary Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, confirmed to be the first film released under the banner in September. October will see the first narrative film released by the studio, the hotly anticipated Joker sequel Joker: Folie à Deux, starring Joaquin Phoenix as the famed Batman villain and Lady Gaga as his beloved sidekick Harley Quinn. With less than six months until release, it was high time for a trailer, and it was the only one they released to the public.
The trailer starts with Fleck’s apparent release from or guarded escort within Arkham, seeing Harley with the prison choir from afar. Seeing her again, she makes fingergun to the head gestures. They sit together and plot to get out. They’re on a rooftop, having a dance to Bacharach classic “What the World Needs Now Is Love”, which the rest of the trailer is set to. Joker runs from…himself, he and Harley put on their own variety show, and there’s frequent makeup application to bring out their real selves. The trailer ends with Harley visiting Joker in again what is probably Arkham Asylum.
Talking about the sequel, billed as a drama with musical elements set in and around Arkham, onstage at the presentation, director Todd Phillips described: “We cast Gaga because she’s magic. I was a producer on A Star is Born and that was where I was like she has magic in her. I’ve never talked about it as a musical, but it’s a movie where music is an essential element.” He continued “The first ways I described Arthur were as weird and aloof and distant, but he has music in him, he has a grace to him. That informed him a lot in the first film. It didn’t seem like that big of a step what we did here.”
Phillips also co-wrote the film with Scott Silver. Catherine Keener, Brendan Gleeson, Jacob Lofland and Harry Lawtey fill out the cast of new characters, with Zazie Beetz the returnee with the presumed biggest role. Releasing on October 4, Joker: Folie à Deux was the capper of the studio’s presentation which also included extended footage of George Miller’s Mad Max prequel Furiosa, Kevin Costner’s Horizon saga, Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 starring Robert Pattinson, which was set up to face off directly against Dog Man with the new January 31, 2025 release date it was given in February, and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, with stars from all of them attending. DC Studios co-CEO Peter Safran was the delegate for the Christopher Reeve documentary, with other co-CEO James Gunn providing a video message while deep in production directing Superman.
Source: Deadline