JOKER Origin Movie with Todd Phillips to Direct and Martin Scorsese as Producer
Warner Bros and DC are in the early stages of another Batman Universe spinoff movie, this one telling the origin story of the signature villain The Joker. The studio has set
The Hangover‘s Todd Phillips to co-write a script with
8 Mile scribe Scott Silver. Phillips will direct the movie, and Martin Scorsese will produce it with Phillips.
This will be the first film under a new banner that has yet to be named in which WB can expand the canon of DC properties and create unique storylines with different actors playing the iconic characters.
Deadline is told that the intention is to make an origin story that isn’t part of any other iteration. The Joker has memorably been part of two Batman movies in the form of Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger, and was most recently played by Jared Leto in the first
Suicide Squad film. He will reprise in the
Suicide Squad sequel and the Harley Quinn spinoff, but this new film will launch the character with a different actor, possibly younger.
An intriguing part is the setting. The intention is to make a gritty and grounded hard-boiled crime film set in early-’80s Gotham City that isn’t meant to feel like a DC movie as much as one of Scorsese’s films from that era, like
Taxi Driver,
Raging Bull or
The King Of Comedy. Deadline is told that Phillips and Silver are writing already, but there is nothing firm on where this will fit into the DC schedule.
Phillips most recently directed
War Dogs with Jonah Hill and Miles Teller. Silver’s recent script credits include
The Fighter as well as
Stronger, the David Gordon Green-directed Toronto-bound drama that stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Jeff Bauman, whose lower legs were blown off near the finish line of the Boston Marathon terror attack.
The Joker Origin Story On Deck: Todd Phillips, Scott Silver, Martin Scorsese Aboard WB/DC Film (Exclusive)
