Lady Gaga's Harley Quinn In Joker 2 Might Be Darker Than You Think

Now that there's an official trailer for "Joker: Folie á Deux," fans got to see even more footage of musician and movie star Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn — and according to director Todd Phillips, she brought a particularly gruesome inspiration to the film's set.

In an interview with Empire Magazine (via IndieWire), Phillips revealed that Lady Gaga invoked one of America's most infamous serial killers as one of her major inspirations during her time playing Harley. "While there are some things that people would find familiar in her, it's really Gaga's own interpretation, and Scott [Silver, co-writer] and I's interpretation," Phillips said, making it quite clear that Lady Gaga's portrayal of this famous character will be extremely different. Why? She used Charles Manson, whose followers murdered actress Sharon Tate and four other innocent people in 1969, as her inspiration.

"She became the way how [Charles] Manson had girls that idolized him," the director of the "Hangover" trilogy continued. "The way that sometimes these [imprisoned murderers] have people that look up to them. There are things about Harley in the movie that were taken from the comic books, but we took it and molded it to the way we wanted it to be."

Elsewhere in the interview, casting director Francie Maisler made it clear that this particular Interpretation of Harley Quinn will blow audiences away, though she admitted it wasn't her idea to cast the pop star. "I didn't suggest Lady Gaga. It wasn't my idea. That was [director] Todd Phillips, before me," Maisler revealed. "But I will tell you, she's really surprising and really good. [...] She's going to blow your mind."

Anyone worried that Harley Quinn — referred to simply as "Lee" by the woman playing her — will feel too much like Lady Gaga herself needn't worry. Elsewhere in the Empire Magazine story, Gaga revealed — per The Hollywood Reporter — that she drastically changed her singing voice for the worse to play Harley. "People know me by my stage name, Lady Gaga, right? That's me as that performer, but that is not what this movie is; I'm playing a character," the Grammy and Oscar-winning singer-songwriter told the magazine. "So I worked a lot on the way that I sang to come from Lee and to not come from me as a performer."

In fact, as Lady Gaga revealed, she worked extensively to make sure that "Lee" is not a particular talented singer. "For me, there's plenty of bum notes, actually, from Lee," the star said. "I'm a trained singer, right? So even my breathing was different when I sang as Lee. When I breathe to sing onstage, I have this very controlled way to make sure that I'm on pitch, and it's sustained at the right rhythm and amount of time, but Lee would never know how to do any of that. So it's like removing the technicality of the whole thing, removing my perceived art form from it all and completely being inside of who she is." Lady Gaga is, at this point, known for immersing herself in her characters — for "House of Gucci," she spoke with an Italian accent and lived as her character Patrizia Reggiani for nine months — but adjusting her singing voice, which is one of her most important instruments as a reporter, is pretty extreme.

In the first "Joker" film — released in 2019 — Joaquin Phoenix reintroduced audiences to the iconic DC Comics villain, this time playing him as a mentally troubled man named Arthur Fleck who isn't given any of the support or care he needs to treat his various, serious conditions. After unleashing a wave of violence upon Gotham, we see Arthur as he's arrested and taken to Arkham Asylum; in the full-length trailer for "Joker: Folie á Deux," it's revealed that Arthur and Harley Quinn meet while she works as a music therapist at the institution. Clearly, Arthur manages to corrupt Harley, who joins him as his followers clamor for his freedom.

Fans will have to wait a little while more to see Phoenix's return to the big screen as Arthur — he won his first Academy Award for playing the role during the 2020 ceremony — as well as Lady Gaga's take on Harley Quinn, but based on the singer's comments, it'll be unlike anything they've seen before. "Joker: Folie á Deux" hits theaters on October 4, 2024.

If you or someone you know needs help with mental health, please contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741, call the National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264), or visit the National Institute of Mental Health website.