We live in a society… where Joker: Folie à Deux bombed.
Whereas 2019’s Joker made over a billion dollars and was nominated for 11 Oscars, including wins for Best Actor and Best Original Score, the 2024 sequel will, uh, not be doing any of that. Joker: Folie à Deux brought in a “tragic” $37.8 million in its first weekend of release at the domestic box office, the same amount of money the original made on its first Friday alone. Critics savaged the film (33 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes), which also earned a dismal “D” CinemaScore. That’s the lowest grade from the survey-taking research firm for a comic book movie ever. Yes, even lower than Madame Web.
Where do stars Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga go from here?
For Phoenix, it’s not the next Todd Haynes movie, that’s for sure, so let’s go right to Lady Gaga. The singer and actress is reportedly “shocked” at the negative reaction to Joker: Folie à Deux. “She put so much heart into the movie,” a source told The Daily Mail. “Her team is quietly looking at other projects they can roll out as they want to move on… as quickly as possible.”
That won’t be difficult. For one thing, Gaga isn’t the issue with Joker: Folie à Deux. In fact, she’s one of the best things about it (“Gaga is a compelling live-wire presence, splitting the difference between affinity and obsession,” The Hollywood Reporter raved), so her magnetic-if-underused performance as Harley “Lee” Quinn won’t stain her filmography. Besides, even before Joker: Folie à Deux came out, Gaga was already hard at work on her next era.
In September, Gaga shared an image on her social media channels of her itinerary, or, because it was in Italian for the Venice Film Festival, her “itinerario.” There were two “date importanti” listed: “04 October: Joker: Folie à Deux in theaters” and “XX October: LG7 first single.”
At some point this month, Gaga will release her the first track from her seventh studio album, and first since 2020’s pandemic-impacted Chromatica (Harlequin doesn’t really count). Little is known about the album, other than Vogue describing one of its songs as an “old-school Gaga banger.” The inspiration to make a full-blown pop album came from Gaga’s fiance, Michael Polansky. “He was like, ‘Babe. I love you. You need to make pop music,’” she explained. Polansky added, “Like anyone would do for the person they love, I encouraged her to lean into the joy of it. On the Chromatica tour, I saw a fire in her; I wanted to help her keep that alive all the time and just start making music that made her happy.”
It was fitting (and perhaps wisely calculated) for Gaga to list Joker: Folie à Deux and LG7 back to back on her “itinerario.” If the movie was a hit, great. If it underperformed compared to Joker, she was ready to return to her music career anyway. But now that we know Joker: Folie à Deux is a flop, something few saw coming, it’s an even more shrewd bit of planning. The low box office, the bad reviews, the behind-the-scenes drama (none of which is Gaga’s fault), all will be forgotten as soon as we get the first taste of LG7.
Lady Gaga is remarkably resilient. She went from playing for a few dozen people in the middle of the afternoon to having the no. 1 single in the country in less than two years, and her career has never waned since then. She’s won Grammys and an Oscar; she’s influenced too many artists to name them all (but here’s one: Chappell Roan); and she’s the rare singer-turned-movie star to receive near-universal acclaim for her acting. Even now, Gaga has the biggest streaming song in the world for the sixth straight week. Not bad for someone nearly 20 years into their career.
The poor reception to Joker: Folie à Deux is a minor footnote in the larger story of Lady Gaga. No matter what her former classmates think, she will be famous.
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