Film Courage: How much time did you have with Joaquin Phoenix before principal photography [JOKER Movie]
Lawrence Sher, ASC: As a cameraman you know, a cinematographer, you don't
necessarily spend that much time it depends on the movie of course but it
depends also on the director and how much rehearsing they do and you may have
if you have a director that does a ton of rehearsing you may spend more time
prior to the movie starting working with those actors and understanding a little
bit of them and they're certainly filmmakers like Sydney the Med and other
guys that like hurts the whole movie with all the actors and Todd's not one
of those guys Joaquin I think is also not necessarily one of those big
rehearsal guys I think he's a classic gamer in sports metaphors
he just wants when it happens he wants to be captured and he sort of wants it
to be when the movies happening for real so my interactions with Joaquin were
very very small and nominal leading up to the first day of shooting I'd see him
for makeup hair tests and certainly when he was like in the office trying the
makeup on for a couple times we would I'd come in I'd take some still pictures
of him I'm gonna have conversations of Todd about but it wasn't like we spent
much time together at all my first real interactions with Akeem in a real sense
was basically day one of shooting watching him perform like for the first
time first shot you know and and then over the course of making the movie we
shot the movie in 58 days I then the relationship really formed and you know
became a relationship by the end where there was a lot more interaction
conversations and certainly I think we both understand hood each other a little
bit more he understood what I was trying to do with the movie I certainly of
course had seen what he was doing with the movie and so there was a lot more
interaction by the end and his ability to make this character who in the end is
is powerful in a destructive way but seems so fragile so I mean there's so my
arms around well Arthur I felt so like he just very well that's the whole
beauty of the way he sort of built the arc of the character with him and Todd
is its it is like it's me meek is one word but it's
not really that he's just a he's just a gentle person like his place in the
movie in the in the early stages is one of you know accommodating to some extent
right you know this there's this just like a there's a there's a sense of each
sense real human sense to him I mean he just really created a very human
character that has all the frailties and and all the things and and that makes it
even the power of him wanting to be a comedian which is such a high-profile I
I mean to me comedians and obviously with Todd having done so many comedies
and I've certainly shot a lot of comedies comedians are the most
fascinating people and I feel like to stand up and do comedy is the hardest
thing in all of the creative arts I really believe that I think you are the
most vulnerable and naked because jokes are jokes right like you go out to set
out to do comedy it's like what his mom says is don't you have to be funny to be
a comedian it's like it's cut and dry it's black and white like you stand out
in front in a spotlight and you try to tell jokes if people aren't laughing
essentially you're not a comedian and it's pretty straightforward and there's
not a lot of argument and you go out and make something that's supposed to move
people generally speaking you don't know that and you're not knowing it instantly
you don't sense it from the audience there it's a lot of internal stuff and I
respect so much anybody who tries stand-up comedian stand-up comedy said
to me what a cool device to take this person that's so small and like you say
you want to hug him because he's he's obviously dresses up like a clown and he
has to perform so he has that part of him but that dichotomy of character the
fact that he is this person that like even when he's stretching his shoes and
you see the frailty of his body and how skinny is and when even when when he
gets the gun from Randall he's even in that moment he's just like I'm not
supposed to have a gun like it's all very small and all
very and I think those elements of Arthur's character and what what Keane
did with them and Todd of course is to me is such a beautiful thing because you
see this massive Toccata me even within the same human being and I think that's
what the movies exploring right exploring those two sides of all of us
you know that are battling constantly right there's like a side that doesn't
want to be seen and there's a side that wants to be seen there's a sign that
wants peace and harmony and there's a side that wants chaos and madness right
and and I think that's really what the movie deals with on a grand level and
which direction do you decide to take to take yourself you know and you know I
think in all of us we try to be good but sometimes we're
fighting or any clinicians to be rageful and angry and all these things I don't
think there's a person among us who's not suffering from from that that that
part of ourselves right that's what being human being is and I think here
you're seeing it explored over the course of a two-hour movie in a way that
I think is pretty pretty effective you could even take and this is off going
off on a tangent a little bit but Andy Kaufman who had that same thing and when
he needed to be larger than life he could be but then he could be ladka you
know that's right and that was a good example of somebody who almost seemed
mad like when he decided to be the other Andy Kaufman the one that was like angry
and it was off in that exact thing right somebody gentle matched but against
anger right it's like the aggressive Andy Kaufman that would fight the
wrestler and getting punched by David you know like the David Letterman Show
all those things it that's a complete opposite spectrum of his personality but
when he was in that personality was in it so deeply that he seemed almost mad
right and insane and so yeah I think it's a good analogy as well since you
had very few meetings with Joaquin Phoenix correct before shooting
principal photography how are you building trust with an actor
that's a really good question I think you build it as you make the movie
honestly I think it's it's you're not necessarily you know there's a certain
level of trust perhaps based on your previous work and either
they like the work and they not you know and not frankly I don't even know I
don't know what Joaquin had seen of mine outside of what he'd probably seen of
todd's he certainly trusted Todd by proxy maybe the things that Todd had
done successfully certainly over the last five films that I've done with him
perhaps that gave Gabe walking in the trust but I think it's no different than
Todd gaining trust with Joaquin I think it happens every day
in small ways right and I think you're just constantly looking to each other
and and and and he's looking for signs and I'm looking for signs of trust and
we're just trying to find and build that trust over time and you know that's
every movie and every everybody and that's sometimes the hardest part is
when you have an actor that comes in for just a day or two and they've obviously
have a lot of experience and quite you know good at what they do and in all
those situations or an actor that's just there for one day you're trying to find
a place to build trust it's one of the fun things about working on movies is
everything is kind of in hyperspeed you know you work in an office perhaps you
get to know an office worker over the course of six months a year and in many
many years but even in an office situation day one for that person
they're all looking for sign and so yeah I've worked in some offices that's just
like they said this is part of human nature right we're just like and I've
always found like that that part of filmmaking to be a subset that's very
interesting to me is the fact that you take these disparate people you put them
together they all have special skills they come together on a project that the
stakes are quite high sometimes they're made for hundreds of millions of dollars
and and you all have to come together and work together quite quickly like you
don't have months to get to know each other you know you often have just days
to get in a situation in which everyone kind of knows their role the boundaries
who's in charge it's it's a very eternally find it fascinating just the
way movies work as a as a piece of art and as a piece of Commerce and and I'm
always interested in that and so you learned some of those things but I think
for Joaquin you know it's also he you know he
started watching some stuff played back on on the monitor and he could watch
some stuff on dailies and I think in watching that I think he started to
understand what the movie was beyond his work because you know as an actor he's
doing his thing but he also has to trust that the editing is gonna work and the
cinematography is gonna work and and everybody is coming together to like he
might think he's doing this amazing thing but all that matters is also are
we capturing it you know and if he did it and we didn't quite capture it well
then nuts then we're not in sync so I think it's like it's an important you
know aspect of a filmmaking is that trust thing and I think sometimes you
don't get it and this I think one of the things I remember texting Todd very
early on I mean I want to say it was like day three and it was just like a
text of saying oh man I think that our first three days are going really well
and it wasn't even a kiss I've email I know Todd for the ages and we were far
from ever kissing each other up but I was actually genuinely saying how
impressed I was how how well he works with actors because I've obviously I've
also done it myself in that he's able to gain trust very quickly and make them
feel like he they're in a really safe place and that there's a really good
give and take and I just remember thinking oh this is the movie is working
well so far earlier than I thought because a lot of movies takes weeks
simply because I could see how much Joaquin already trusted Todd and I
thought that was that was a good sign for sure yeah what's the most emotion
you felt filming Joaquin's performance that's a really good question I mean I
felt that so many different times I felt it
I think we need performs at the comedy club is a pretty powerful one just
watching him be so exposed on stage sort of failing and but just carrying on and
just they've something in his eyes and that scene that has always gets me the
scene when he like is trying to get the papers from the clerk Brian Tyree Henry
and and that little 101 scene with the that sort of in between the clerk's the
great that's in front of separating them this this is just I love that
performance of that scene I find it to be mesmerizing I'm always sort of
leaning forward when I watch that scene with him I mean there's probably many
many I'm just trying to think of the ones that popped in my head at first I
think that's seen on the bus certainly shooting that scene on the bus
we shot that scene it was day two or day three maybe okay two actually so it was
the second day of our shooting was that scene on the bus with the with the kid
and the little boy and the like just seen shooting his side of the action
right it's all cut up obviously like a scene now but just shooting him perform
that scene that early in the shoot I went oh my god this guy is something
else this guy is the best I've ever seen and what he's doing already with this
performance and what he's doing to create Arthur Fleck as a human being
who's suffering you know I thought it was beautiful because in that one scene
he's doing everything right he's he starts having just had gotten beaten up
by a bunch of kids in an alley so he's coming into the scene still living in
that space looking out the window and then he's not trying to connect and do
his thing which he's sort of conditioned to do as a human being but also who he
really is which is to try to make some little boy smile and then he sort of
reprimanded for it and then goes into this coughing is this laughing fit which
I think always embarrasses him because it's on
something he can't control and then has to hand out this card that describes it
so in that one scene it kind of like shows all the facets of him as a human
being and I've always found that seem to be really really powerful and also to
the scene in the bathroom where he confronts his yes yeah yeah yeah
yeah where he's really truly you know just reaching in it's like he's just
trying to find a connection you know and just trying to sort of find that part of
him that's missing you know whether it's his father or just another person to
help you know be there with him so he's not so lonely in this world you know and
the scenes with his mother when they would watch the game show or the talk
shows yeah that's a lovely scene in the beginning yeah or even when he's washing
her hair it's like it's lovely it's like this is at least two people have each
other in the world and I think that's what makes the revelation of her and
what she did to him as a youngster and you know and and allowing his abuse and
some of those things what makes it obviously so powerful when it's revealed
sure will you ever laugh or cry while you're filming no for sure I definitely
laughed I mean I've laughed out loud obviously
Todd and I've made a bunch of movies in which not many times but I've certainly
like laughed enough that it's like gotten on the soundtrack and oh my god
you know we obviously can't affect this the take but but I've cried in certainly
operating the camera and watching a scene before for sure for sure I've done
that in movies that I've done I've been a part of yeah yeah sometimes you just
incredibly moved when you're watching something happen for real sometimes you
could separate yourself and go into sort of work mode in which you're you're
thinking about the next shot and Nick you're not as present as you'd like to
be but when you are watching somebody work in a really high level and they
really are just performing it you know in that way it drags you right back into
the present in the bed way possible and you're compelled to
just have nothing else in your head except to watch that person perform and
then it can become amazingly powerful and even if like I'm not sure I I cried
and I certainly laughed watching Joaquin because there was a lot of physical
humor in the movie that some some of its not in the movie still but just the way
that he could do you know whatever it was doing like you know falling down or
just his physicality and you know the scene when he gets fired and so it was a
little bit of a longer scene than is in the final cut of the movie and when we
shot that scene there was like there were sections of that that I just was I
was heartbroken by because he really wanted that job yeah you recognized that
losing that job was really just it was very powerful to him and and I remember
when we shot that scene feeling really moved for sure yeah I think that one was
one of maybe three were yeah I definitely the tissue out yeah he's
definitely you know again he's a human being in spite of all that who he
becomes and this sort of like villain that the Joker is supposed to be at you
know at his heart he still just a man
you