'Joker' Director Todd Phillips Teases Production With New Photo

Cameras are set to start rolling on DC Films' Joker origin movie now that September is here, and director Todd Phillips is kicking things off with a new photo for fans.

In a post to Instagram today, Phillips shared a striking black and white photo of himself looking away from the camera, a bit of what appeared to be cigarette smoke around him with a simple caption: "Here we go". You can check it out below.

Here we go.

A post shared by Todd Phillips (@toddphillips1) on Sep 2, 2018 at 9:46am PDT

With the movie's production getting underway, Joker and Wonder Woman 1984 are the only two DC projects currently in production right, but that doesn't mean Joker is getting off on the best foot. Last week, the project hit a snag. It was announced last Monday that Alec Baldwin was joining the film, heavily rumored to be playing Bruce Wayne's father Thomas Wayne, but just a few days later Baldwin abruptly left the project.

"I'm no longer doing that movie," Baldwin told USA Today citing scheduling issues before adding "sure there are 25 guys who can play that part."

Fortunately. the film's star Joaquin Phoenix is still on firmly on board. The actor revealed in an interview with Collider recently that he's been trying to play the role of the iconic Batman villain for a few years.

"Three or four years ago, I called my agent and said, 'Why don't they want to take one of these characters and just make a lower budget film about it, a movie but a character study, and why not take one of the villains?'" Phoenix previously said. "And I thought, 'You can't do the Joker, because, you know, it's just you can't do that character, it's just been done.' So, I was trying to think of other characters, and he said 'I'll set up a general meeting with Warner Bros.' And I said, 'I'm not gonna go, I can't go to a general meeting.'

"So, I completely forgot about it, and so then I heard about this idea, I was like, 'Oh that's so exciting, that's the kind of experience I wanted to have, with a movie based on a comic character.' I felt like you could get something on screen."

Joker is scheduled to premiere in theaters on October 4, 2019.