Lady Gaga Changed Her Name While Filming 'Joker 2'

Lady Gaga Changed Her Name While Filming 'Joker 2',The actress asked crew members to call her 'Lee' while working, but it's not clear where she got the name.

Lady Gaga Changed Her Name While Filming ‘Joker 2’

Lady Gaga is a master of reinventing her own identity, and apparently, she did so on the set of Joker 2 with the cast and crew. In a recent podcast interview, cinematographer Lawrence Sher recounted how Gaga asked him to call her “Lee” during the filming of the sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux. To his surprise, it went a long way to improving their working relationship.

Gaga was born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, and she has worn many names and identities over the last few years. She has a strong background in music and acting – particularly method acting. In a recent interview on The Trenches Talk, Sher suggested that Gaga was acting in this way to some extent from the moment he met her. he said: “I didn’t know Stefani at all. Strangely, I feel like I never even met her, even during the makeup/hair tests. Because again, maybe it was my philosophy of not trying to get in their space.”

“Joker: Folie à Deux” director of photography Lawrence Sher says Lady Gaga opted to be called “Lee” on set. pic.twitter.com/Rv32mOHBrY

— Lady Gaga Now 🃏 (@ladygaganownet) July 20, 2023

“And then I remember for a week, being like, god, I feel like we are disconnecting,” Sher went on. “Not even connecting. We are like on opposites. And I would say to my crew, ‘Jesus, I can’t, like, crack it. She either hates me or we hate each other. There’s something weird going on here.’ I barely said anything, except I would say, ‘Stefani, this is where your second team was, minor little things,’ and then the AD at one point said, ‘Oh you know, Stef would like if you just called her Lee on set.’ And I was like, oh, 100 percent, and I literally said, the next thing I said, was something ‘Lee,’ and it was like everything changed. From that point on, it was like she was… our whole connection changed. I was like, alright, cool.”

It’s unclear why Gaga chose “Lee” as her on-set name. Several reports have speculated that it could be short for her character’s name, Harley Quinn, or it could be derived from her middle name Angelina. In most other iterations of the character, Harley Quinn’s legal name is Dr. Harleen Quinzel, so it could be a nod toward that as well.

Gaga infamously used method acting in her other recent roles as well, including House of Gucci where she used her Italian accent all through the filming process, even when the cameras were off. While promoting A Star Is Born, she claimed that she had stayed in character “for years” around the making of the film. Now she is working with Joaquin Phoenix, another well-known proponent of method acting, so there’s no telling how far the two might take it.

Joker: Folie à Deux officially wrapped filming in April and is currently slated for release on Oct. 3, 2024. The first Joker movie is streaming now on Max.

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