When we first caught word that a JOKER movie was in the works at Warner Bros., it was said that Martin Scorsese was attached to produce and potentially direct the film. But when that JOKER movie eventually went into production with Todd Phillips at the helm, Scorsese wasn't involved with it at all. Speaking with the BBC, Scorsese said he was actually attached to the project for four years, but ended up walking away from it because he didn't have time for it, and also because
I don’t know if I make the next step into this character developing into a comic book character. You follow? He develops into an abstraction. It doesn’t mean it’s bad art, it’s just not for me…"
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Scorsese was involved with JOKER while it was being developed, he knows Phillips very well, his producer Emma Tillinger Koskoff produced the film, and he said he "know(s) the script very well. It has a real energy and Joaquin." Taking all of this into account, you might think that he would be interested in seeing how the finished film turned out. But when he recently spoke with The New York Times, Scorsese didn't seem very interested in JOKER at all.
The legendary filmmaker told The New York Times' Dave Itzkoff,
I saw clips of it. I know it. So it’s like, why do I need to [see it]? I get it. It’s fine."
Scorsese is familiar with the JOKER script written by Phillips and Scott Silver, he has seen clips of Joaquin Phoenix in action, and it sounds like he's content with leaving it at that.
Plenty of other moviegoers have seen JOKER in the last few months – the film's worldwide box office haul is well over $1 billion.
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