Will ‘Joker’ Start Its Own Movie Universe? Todd Phillips Wants Batman Film Set in Same World Todd Phillips’ ‘Joker’ script makes it clear his comic book drama does not exist within Warner Bros.’ larger DC Extended Universe (which includes films such as “Justice League,” “Wonder Woman,” and “Aquaman”), but what if “Joker” launched its own film universe? That question has clearly been on Phillips’ mind considering his conversation with Variety at the Palm Springs International Film Festival. Phillips expressed interest in seeing a project that tackles Batman within the “Joker” universe. “Joker” starred Dante Pereira-Olson as young Bruce Wayne and climaxes with the death of his parents, who are murdered in the riot ignited by Joaquin Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck/Joker. The “Joker” ending sets Bruce on his comic book path to becoming Batman. “It’s a beautiful Gotham. What I would like to see someone tackle is what Batman looks like from that Gotham,” Phillips said. “I’m not saying I’m goin
How ‘Joker’ Editor Jeff Groth Helped Transform Arthur Fleck © Courtesy of Warner Bros./Niko Tavernise Editor Jeff Groth worked with “Joker” director Todd Phillips on “The Hangover Part III” before landing the blockbuster drama starring Joaquin Phoenix. You cut the film as consecutively as possible so you could see the progression of the character while you were still editing. Can you talk a little bit about that? With a movie called “Joker,” you know quite solidly where you’re going to land at the end. So it was about how are we getting and moving forward to that? It’s [about] the progression from beginning to end. It starts in one particular place and ends in another; we always look and kind of see where we were in our timeline of Arthur [transforming into] Joker. You were also able to cut the movie with some of the score rather than temp track — did that make a difference to the editing process? It made a big difference. There were five or six songs that came before we e