Joker is the “perfect movie for 2019,” which explains why we can’t stop arguing about it. The conversations surrounding the comic book adaptation — which, at its core, is about a bad stand-up comedian who dresses up as a clown — have turned ugly and potentially violent. It’s almost enough to make you want to skip seeing it entirely.
But you shouldn’t, because then you’d miss Marc Maron’s “pretty good” scene.
In a recent episode of WTF, Maron, who says he has “one scene in the f*cking Joker movie, and I did pretty good,” criticized the “swirl of questions” around the movie. “I know there’s a swirl of questions, some sort of cultural psychic whirlwind around the timing of the movie, the nature of the movie, whether this is the right time for a movie about a guy who’s mentally troubled and snaps,” he told listeners. “All that shit I understand, but shouldn’t the focus be on health care, mental-health treatment on a national level?”
“I know that that anger doesn’t always have a place to land, but it can’t land on movies. If anything the media debate of it is trying to provoke something awful to happen. Movies don’t cause this, and I don’t see how blaming movies is going to help anything. I don’t think that movies are to blame for mentally unstable people taking action in a criminal, violent way.” (Via)
Maron was initially hesitant to sign up for a comic book movie — he’s not one of them stinking “grown male nerdchilds” — but he was won over by Joker‘s “very interesting approach to this world” (if not director Todd Phillips’ recent comments on “woke culture” and comedy). He also might enjoy that the Joker listed Richard Pryor as one of his guys.
Listen to the complete episode (with Danny DeVito!) here.
