Director Todd Phillips on Making ‘Joker': Art Is ‘Meant to Be Complicated’

This is not a junket interview. Yes, “Joker” director Todd Philips had ground through 46 interviews the day before. He slept fitfully at the Four Seasons Beverly Hills to be on time for a second day of round-robin interviews in the international media machine that is the required job description for big studio releases like one based on a classic DC Comics character. But this conversation is a long, quiet, rambling reflection in a hard-to-find hotel nook on why the creator of the billion-dollar global “Hangover” franchise and other broad comedies like “Old School” decided to co-write and direct a supervillain movie in the style of an art-house ’70s flick. Phillips, a lean and emotionally taut 49-year-old, has a lot to say about the subject, but it boils down to this: He was trying to shake up a saturated studio system. “It’s very difficult nowadays to cut through the fog of all this content,” said Phillips, dressed casually in jeans and a dark t-shirt. “There’s great content everywhere, let alone YouTube and everything. I was just thinking about it more as a movie that can cut through the fog. Not necessarily enter the zeitgeist, which it feels like it’s almost...

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