Harley Quinn Showrunner Debunks Rumors on Margot Robbie’s Involvement

This week saw the first season finale of the amazing Harley Quinn animated series on DC Universe, which features the vocal talents of Kaley Cuoco in the title role. While the series is yet another mature offering much like the R-rated Birds of Prey movies, it doesn’t share a lot in common with the DC Comics movie aside from gratuitous violence and gratuitous F-bombs. But for a time there were rumors that the series would also feature the vocal talents of big screen actress Margot Robbie, who portrays Harley Quinn in multiple movies.

But now Harley Quinn showrunner Justin Halpern is clearing the air on those rumors when asked if there was ever a plan for Robbie to star in the series instead of Cuoco.

“Not really. Margot was interested in what we were doing and we had a couple of conversations with her, but it was mostly because she was curious because they were concurrently doing Birds of Prey,” Halpern explained to the GWW. “So we met with her, we pitched out a few episodes to her and our general arc and she was very thoughtful and kind and just listened and that was kind of it. It wasn’t like she said no and then we went to Kaley, Margot just wanted to be informed.”

It seems like much of the concern revolved around whether or not the animated series would step on the toes of what Robbie had planned for Birds of Prey.

“I remember in one meeting, Margot turned to Geoff Johns and was like ‘Is this similar to what we’re doing?’ and Geoff was like ‘Trust me, this is way way different tonally than what you’re doing,’ and that was that. And I have to imagine he was right,” Halpern explained. “I haven’t seen [Birds of Prey], but I’m guessing it’s not as overtly comedic as our show.”

Halpern praised Cuoco’s approach to the character when it was pointed out that Harley has her traditional accent when she’s around Joker, while she spoke in her own normal dialect when the two characters are a part — this is a major indicator of the affect the Clown Prince of Crime has on Ms. Quinzell.

“It was a joint decision by one of the [executive producers], Dean Lorey, and Kaley. Kaley would add so many little touches like that, along with her voice director, Charlie Adler,” Halpern explained. “Like, in the episode where she went home, Kaley was like ‘when people go back home they slip into a thicker accent’ so she did that. She’s a really thoughtful performer, which is rare. Not every actor is like that! We got so lucky with our cast. They were all just total killers.”

Season 2 of Harley Quinn is reportedly set to premiere on April 3rd.