The first official look at Lady Gaga‘s acting in Joker: Folie a Deux is here. On Tuesday, Joker released a clip of Gaga’s Harley Quinn meeting with Joaquin Phoenix‘s Joker early in Folie a Deux as she validates the villain’s murder, which landed him in an asylum.
The scene sees Gaga’s Harley — well, rather, Dr. Harleen Quintal, bare-faced and messy-haired — talking to the Joker inside the Arkham Asylum.
“When I first saw Joker, when I saw you and Murray Franklin, the whole time I was watching, I kept thinking, ‘I hope this guy blows his brains out,’” Harley tells Joker, referring to the closing scene in the first Joker film. “And then you did.”
“And for once in my life, I didn’t feel so alone anymore,” she continues as Phoenix smirked. Then Quinn starts singing the lyrics to Judy Garland’s “Get Happy” to Joker before a guard blows his whistle and the scene ends.
“Forget your troubles, C’mon, Get happy/You better chase all your cares away,” sang Gaga’s Quinn. “Sing ‘hallelujah,’ c’mon get happy/Get ready for the judgment day.”
Also on Tuesday, Gaga shared her upcoming itinerary for the next two months, which includes appearances at the film’s world premiere on Sept. 4 and a European press junket before the film hits theaters on Oct. 4. In the post, she also teased the release of her album’s first single, which she’s been hinting at for several months, with the words: “XX October: LG7 first single.”
The new Folie a Deux clip comes after Joker released a new trailer, which saw clips of Phoenix descending into chaos. “He’s not sick!” declares Quinn. “He’s perfect… You’re Joker.”
In the new film, Phoenix will return as Fleck, the struggling, mentally ill clown and stand-up comedian who’s driven to madness and the warm embrace of his evil alter ego, Joker. Gaga will play Dr. Harleen Quintal, a psychiatrist at Gotham’s infamous Arkham Asylum, where Fleck winds up at the end of Joker.
Variety reported in March that the film might be closer to a full-blown jukebox musical. Insiders revealed that Folie à Deux was expected to feature at least 15 reinterpretations of “very well-known” songs, and that composer Hildur Guðnadóttir would “infuse her distinctive, haunting [music] cues” into the numbers. A track list was not revealed, though the one song teased was “That’s Entertainment,” from the 1953 musical The Band Wagon.
The first Joker grossed more than $1 billion at the global box office, earning 11 Oscar nominations, with two wins: Best Actor for Phoenix and Best Original Score for Hildur Guðnadóttir.
