The Batman: Barry Keoghan Reveals Horrifying Experience Putting on Joker Makeup

Stepping into the role of The Joker has famously been difficult for actors like Heath Ledger and Jared Leto, both of whom reportedly approached it as method actors and both of whom reportedly struggled to get the character's crazed negativity out of their system. According to Barry Keoghan, who played the Joker opposite Robert Pattinson in director Matt Reeves's The Batman, the danger he had getting into character was a bit more...surface level. After six hours in makeup -- a long time to film a quickie cameo for the end of the movie -- Keoghan said that the metal "staples" in the Joker makeup really were pulling at his skin, worrying him that he might actually injure himself or leave a scar. And that's even before they had to pause everything because somebody on set had COVID.

Keoghan, though, seems pretty happy to have the part. He posed over the weekend with fellow Joker Joaquin Phoenix at the Golden Globe Awards.

"That took six hours to get into that, and it was like oh man, I couldn't sit still or six hours, I really couldn't. I remember we were aroudn five hours in, and went 'We're shutting production down, there's COVID,'" Keoghan told GQ. "I was like 'Huh? Really? What? What happened?' There was this steel thing that went [into my cheek] and it was like slicing in. I was like, I'm really going to be left with a scar here."

He said that he and Pattinson first encountered one another and laughed at the absurdity of their makeup and wardrobe. Fittingly, per Keoghan's retelling, he got the last "laugh."

You can see the full video below.

Famously, Keoghan took it upon himself to try out to play the Riddler -- but since Reeves already had somebody in mind, he inadvertently landed himself an offer to play The Joker instead.

"Originally there was no audition," Keoghan said. "I just made myself an audition tape because I saw an article saying that they wanted The Riddler in the new Batman.I was like, 'Oh, yeah, I'd love to play that.' I just made a tape. I said, 'Feck, I'll just buy myself a cane and a hat, find myself a corridor and film myself walking down ot. Add some little bit of swag to it and a bit of music, and let's see, will that get me an audition?' So I done that, and they said, 'No, but you want to play the Joker?' I was like, 'Yeah.'"