From the moment the first trailer for Cruella dropped in February, people couldn’t help but compare Emma Stone’s live-action portrayal of a young Cruella de Vil to Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker thanks to her Harley Quinn-esque look in the villainous origin story. Almost instantly, Cruella earned the nickname “Girl Joker,” and it’s gotten to the point where Stone and director Craig Gillespie are addressing the comparison between the two films.
While doing the cover interview for the latest issue of Total Film (via GamesRadar), Stone laughed away the suggestion that Cruella is anything like the dark DC Comics film. “It’s very different from Joker in many ways,” she said before making it clear that she’d never compare herself to Phoenix, who she admires as an actor. “I wish I was more like him.”
As for Gillespie, the director went the more obvious route by highlighting that Joker is a Rated-R movie, and despite the fact that it’s about a full-on puppy murderer who wears the skin of her victims as a coat, Cruella is a Disney film meant for general audiences. “It’s definitely its own thing,” Gillespie said. “Just to sort of reframe Cruella, I thought it was important to show this darker side of her. But there’s going to be a lot of fun, a lot of humor in it. There’s a lot of absolutely delightful banter and rhythm to the style of it, which is different from Joker.”
Cruella hits theaters and Disney+ with Premier Access on May 28.
(Via Total Film/Games Radar)