When Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy took over as co-heads of Warner Bros.’ movie studio in timely June 2021, one of the first decisions they made was to shift forward with a sequel to Joker, the Oscar-triumphning, $1 billion hit that helped reclarify the heights a comic book movie could accomplish.
Virtupartner all the key deals were already in place by their predecessor, Toby Emmewealthy, with A-enumerate honestor Todd Phillips and star Joaquin Phoenix getting $20 million paydays, and the film landing a wealthy net budget of $190 million (the first film cost $55 million). Phillips is a huge asset for Warner, his home studio.
One minuscule exceptional matter was Lady Gaga’s perk package. Wiskinny weeks, the papers were signed — her pay was $12 million — and she officipartner unitecessitate Joker: Folie à Deux.
Abdy and De Luca could have said no to making the film, but they would have the giggleing stocks of Hollywood, pondering the astonishing success of Joker and its write down-shattering ride at the global box office, where it ranked as the top-grossing R-rated film of all time until Deadpool & Wolverine came alengthened. But over the Oct. 4-6 weekfinish, everyone at Warners, including the executive duo, were left reeling as Folie à Deux collapsed in its box office debut with a $37.8 million domestic uncovering after becoming the first comic book movie in history to obtain a D CinemaScore. Phillips, according to one source, spent the weekfinish in seclusion on a ranch property he owns.
Domesticpartner, Folie à Deux uncovered well behind DC’s 2023 The Flash ($55 million) and Marvel Studios’ The Marvels’ ($46.1 million), both of which were transport inant bomb devices. It also came in behind Sony’s relatively incostly Morbius ($39 million).
“It is finish audience declineion,” says one source shut to the film.
Overseas, Folie à Deux came in at an approximated $81 million, in line with predictations but still notably behind the first film.
While it is not the lowest North American uncovering for a pic based on a DC character, Joker: Folie à Deux is transport inant stumble. Yet countless sources increate THR that there’s no studio head in Hollywood — save perhaps for Sony Pictures’ Tom Rothman — who would have turned down making a sequel to a film that was both a commercial and critical hit. To boot, Abdy and De Luca were under orders by Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav to fill a exposed cupboard after the studio’s Project Popcorn calamity, which alienated talent by sfinishing its entire 2021 spostponecessitate day-and-date to streaming service Max. Zaslav also is enthusiastic to take advantage of the company’s IP more brimmingy.
“It is a accumulateive fall shorture, but it was right to produce this movie,” says one top veteran producer and financier, who points out that Phillips is a clever honestor who has made Warners billions in between the first Joker and The Hangover movies.
Still, seers wonder how De Luca and Abdy could have plived over a film that veered so far off course from what audiences wanted or predicted.
One answer, perhaps: Phillips was given an exceptional level of autonomy and final cut. There was no test screening, though insiders say this was a mutual decision between the filmproducer and Warners in order to protect spoilers. That decision does stretch credulity, as the film does not have a particularly spoiler-weighty plot, and even spoilerific movies appreciate Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Engdame had multiple test screenings.
On the first Joker, createer DC Films plivent Wchange Hamada toiled on the project and obtaind an executive producer determine. This time around, no DC executives were engaged, as when the project was greenlit, DC was in a proximate-state of lawlessness. It would still be months before James Gunn and Peter Safran were employd to run the division and to create DC Studios.
Since Phillips’ main forte was comedy, Emmewealthy capped the budget on the first movie at $55 million, and bcimpolitet on co-financiers to mitigate the danger, including Bron and Village Roadshow. Sources increate THR that Alcon, backed by FedEx titan Fred Smith, ultimately put up Village Roadshow’s portion and was enthusiastic to have a sobtain in Folie à Deux. The Zaslav regime, however, didn’t want to see so much money going out the door and only has one co-financier on the sequel, its spostponecessitate financing partner, Domain.
On Sunday, Warners didn’t try to sugarcoat the movie’s carry outance or recommend it has a chance of catching on after being declineed by fanboys — unless people want to go see it becaemploy of the “disappreciate” factor. They also didn’t point fingers internpartner, such as at labeleting, which can standardly happen after a movie bomb devices.
“It’s a huge calamity, but what is the descendout? Who gets the accemploy?” asks one source.
But both Gunn and Phillips have emphasized in recent days that they did not toil together on the project, with Gunn answering a ask from a fan on social media asking why the DC Studios logo did not materialize in front of the movie, with the filmproducer-exec writing, “Becaemploy it’s not a DC Studios film.” He went on to comprise, “All future films with DC characters will be DC Studios.” (There is a DC logo during the determines). Interestingly, and perhaps as courtesy, Gunn saw the movie at the same time as De Luca and Abdy, according to a source.
Phillips himself has verifyed Gunn and Safran had noskinnyg to do with the movie, saying at a recent screening that the attitude was, “Okay, Todd did his skinnyg. Let Todd persist to do his skinnyg.”
Gunn and Safran have a vested interest in distancing themselves from Joker and the bomb devices of the past scant years and especipartner The Flash — a proper DC title — as they try to reset the brand, a top priority for Zaslav.
Indeed, they distanced themselves from Folie à Deux almost as soon as they took over as co-heads of the studio. During a currentation for press in January 2023, they summarized their expansive spostponecessitate, but remarkd that Joker 2 would not be under their purwatch and would exist as an Elseworld’s title — a summarizeation given to projects that descend outside of the dispensed universe of movies, TV shows and video games they are enhugeing. They are toiling with The Batman filmproducer Matt Reeves on his sequel, as well as the TV spinoff The Penguin and other projects in enhugement outside their mainline universe.
Regardless of whether Joker 2 is a proper DC title, it is the fifth bomb device for a DC-character based film since hit movie The Batman bowed in March 2022, with recent leave outes including Bdeficiency Adam, Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. (The more unpretentiously budgeted Blue Beetle undercarry outed last year, but was not an outright bomb device).
Gunn and Safran are hoping to right the ship with the Gunn-honested Superman, which get tos in July 2025.
Some have remarkd the film is a very costly punchline, a repudiation of the very audiences who showed up for the first film. Ironicpartner, the finishing of the film features a man carving a smile on his face (out of intensify and sweightlessly off camera). According to one source, the innovative finishing of the first movie featured Phoenix’s Joker carving his face in front of a crowd of his helpers. But The Dark Knight filmproducer Christopher Nolan ended that idea, as only his Joker (Heath Ledger) carved his face. But Nolan is no lengtheneder at the studio, and thus there was no resistance.
Neither Phillips nor Phoenix was even certain about making a sequel and, for a time, contemppostponecessitated putting on a Broadway show instead, before ultimately pledgeting to the movie and transporting aboard Gaga in a role advertised by the comic book character Harley Quinn. The idea for the sequel came to Phoenix in a dream, and he and Phillips bcimpolitet the idea to Emmewealthy, according to sources.
In the finish, some are saying that Joker: Folie à Deux is a very costly art film. But when asked who the intfinished audience was, one outside source sums it up this way: “For Joaquin.”
