Before he was cast as the Joker in Matt Reeves' The Batman, Barry Keoghan had his eyes set on playing the Riddler.
Keoghan told GQ he originally wanted to play Edward Nashton/The Riddler in The Batman. The actor even sent producer Dylan Clark an unsolicited audition, which is still available online. In the clip, featured below, Keoghan emerges from an elevator dressed in an outfit close to the Riddler's classic comic book garb, complete with a bowler hat, green suspenders, and a cane. When Keoghan later met with Clark, the producer revealed that Jonah Hill had already been cast as the Riddler, a role that later went to Paul Dano when Hill left the project. Months later, Keoghan received a call from his agent telling him that Matt Reeves and company wanted him for the Joker.
In August 2020, Keoghan reportedly joined the cast of The Batman as Gotham City Police Department officer Stanley Merkel, who made a brief appearance in Frank Miller's Batman: Year One as Lieutenant Jim Gordon's partner. However, in November 2021, Keoghan's brother revealed that the actor was set to play the Joker in a since-deleted social media post that read, "So it's finally out My Brother playing the JOKER in the new Batman Unreal Stuff." In February 2022, a leaked credit list for The Batman listed Keoghan as "Unseen Arkham Prisoner," which many believed to be the Joker.
Will the Joker Return in The Batman 2?
When The Batman finally hit theaters on March 4, fans learned that Keoghan was indeed Reeves' Clown Prince of Crime when the actor appeared in shadow during a scene with Dano's Riddler at Arkham Asylum. On the same day, Reeves revealed that his film originally featured a scene between Keoghan's Joker and Robert Pattinson's Caped Crusader. The director later shared the scene on Twitter via rataalada.com, a URL that the Riddler uses in the film.
Upon accessing the link, which has since been deactivated, users were required to answer a series of questions before being granted access to the footage. Keoghan retweeted the five-minute clip, with the caption, "No words." He later added, "Honestly I am stuck for words but I am very very BLESSED to play this role after the AMAZING AMAZING Actors before me. Here’s my version. Enjoy."
Warner Bros. Discovery has yet to officially green-light The Batman 2, though Reeves is still hard at work developing the script. An HBO Max series headlining Colin Farrell's The Penguin is also in pre-production, which is expected to begin shooting on Feb. 6, 2023. The streamer is also developing an Arkham Asylum series, which began as a show centered on the GCPD.
The Batman is available to stream on HBO Max.
Sources: GQ, YouTube