Lady Gaga finally addresses Joker: Folie à Deux bombing at the box office
Lady Gaga has spoken out about Joker 2’s negative reviews. (Michael Buckner/Variety via Getty Images)
Lady Gaga has addressed the lack of success that Joker: Folie à Deux received at the box office following its theatrical release.
The “Die With A Smile” hitmaker has recently announced her upcoming album Mayhem, and has spoken out about navigating the negative reviews of the follow-up to Todd Philips’ Joker.
The October 2024 musical/thriller sequel to the hit 2019 film stars Joaquin Phoenix as the titular protagonist, also known as Arthur Fleck, and Gaga as Arkham Asylum resident Harley Quinn.
Critics widely panned the film as “dramatically inert” and a “tiresome, tedious experience,” resulting in a disappointing 33 per cent critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the film received a second-weekend revenue estimate of $7 million from 4,102 theatres – a history-making 81 per cent decline.
In an interview with Elle Magazine, Gaga simply said: “People just sometimes don’t like some things.
“It’s that simple. And I think to be an artist, you have to be willing for people to sometimes not like it,” she reflected. “And you keep going even if something didn’t connect in the way that you intended.”
She added that a fear of failure can be damaging. “When that makes its way into your life, that can be hard to get control of. It’s part of the mayhem.”
However, the title of her upcoming album is about embracing the “mayhem”.
“Mayhem is about following your own chaos into whatever cranny of your life that it takes you to,” she said to the outlet. “And in that way, it was about following the songs.
“Writing as many songs as I did for this album was a labour of total love. And then you just have to be very cutthroat by the end.”
Lady Gaga’s upcoming album Mayhem is set to be released on 7 March and is available for pre-order now.
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