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It was one of the most anticipated films at the Venice Film Festival, and if the reception towards Joker: Madness to two was finally quite cold (the first reviews speak of a “frustrating movie”which spends its time breaking what the first part had established, even though it was already designed by Todd Phillips), Lady Gaga And Joaquin Phoenix still caused a sensation on the red carpet. As well as at the press conference.
Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga transform Venice into Folie à Deux
The first was questioned about her status as a singer-actress, led to recount this original experience. Madness for two will have a very different atmosphere from the first one Jokerespecially because the blockbuster contains several sung and choreographed scenes. The star does not consider however “not quite Joker 2 like a musical”and detailed his vision to journalists present on the Lido:
“The music in this film, it holds a really special place, it's extremely nuanced. I wouldn't say it's a musical, because it's very different on several points. Let's say that the way we use songs in the film is to give the characters a way to express themselves when words are no longer enough. (…) Personally, I had to 'unlearn' singing or breathing techniques, I had to let the song fully come out of my character.”
Joaquin Phoenix, for his part, was mainly questioned about his new physical transformation. Because after losing a lot of weight to play Arthur Fleck in the first opus released in 2019 at the cinema (around 25 kilos, by his own admission), the actor had regained some of his strength for Beau is Afraidby Ari Aster, and Napoleonby Ridley Scott. So he had to go on a diet again to Madness for twobut this time he struggled to lose weight.
At the time, Phoenix had joked about the “simplicity” of his diet, consisting of eating according to him “lots of vegetables and salad” without having to undergo any special physical training to appear skinnier than ever on screen. This time, it was different: the film required its main actors to undergo numerous dance rehearsals.
“I won't go into details about my diet, I don't think anyone is interested, he begins. But this time, it was much more complicated for me because we had so much training, we rehearsed a lot of choreographies… which we hadn't done the previous time. So yes, it was harder, but at the same time it was safe. Well, you're right, I'm 49 now, I shouldn't do this anymore. This is probably my last diet.”
“You know, Stefani also lost weight for this film, Joaquin Phoenix continued, turning to his playing partner. I remember when we met for rehearsals and then we saw each other again on set, you melted. It was very impressive.”
Despite the actor's offer, Lady Gaga also does not detail her own diet:
“I think it's just our job to transform ourselves into our characters during a given period. We manage to do that through all sorts of details.”
When a journalist insisted on knowing exactly how much weight Joaquin Phoenix had lost, he responded bluntly:
“I know I'm to blame for talking about it too much in the first part. Because it's a difficult thing, it becomes your obsession. You think about the goal of reaching a certain weight all the time. Then you find yourself in interviews talking about it over and over again, becoming this insufferable actor who can't stop talking about his weight loss. I hated myself afterwards for making such a fuss about it, because at the end of the day, everyone just does what they have to do to immerse themselves in a role. So this time, I thought: 'No, I'm not going to make the same mistake again.' (He whispers) Well, okay, this time it was only 20 kilos. No, I'm kidding, I don't know how much I lost exactly.”
Joker: Madness for Two will be released in theaters on October. Here is its trailer:
Joaquin Phoenix refuses to explain his departure from Todd Haynes' film