Joaquin Phoenix Surprises Audiences at L.A. Alamo Drafthouse ‘Joker’ Screenings

Moviegoers who ventured to see Joker at an Alamo Drafthouse in Los Angeles were given a good surprise over the weekend, when Joaquin Phoenix showed up in person to greet them. 

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Phoenix made an appearance before and after select Joker screenings that took place in L.A. theaters on Saturday night, and took pictures and spoke with fans. The surprise cameo(s) from the film’s star were, not surprisingly, received positively by audiences.

“I hope you liked it,” Phoenix told the crowd, prior to adding, “Don’t tell me if you didn’t. Even if you did, I don’t want to know. But thanks so much.”

Phoenix’s in-movie dancing was brought up by an audience member, as it previously was last week in an interview with Jimmy Kimmel that could be described as semi-to-outright-awkward (as if there’s any other kind of outcome for a Joaquin Phoenix late night interview). Phoenix credited choreographer Michael Arnold for tightening up his dancing, and also for helping him come up with some of Joker’s moves.

“He just started showing me a bunch of video footage of different dancers and you know, YouTube, you just get sucked down a hole and you start finding stuff,” Phoenix said of the choreographer. “I don’t really know where it came from. A lot of it we just kind of were discovering in the moment, like in the bathroom and the subway — it’s something that [director] Todd [Phillips] and I just kind of figured out, like that day when we were shooting.”

Despite controversy that often felt forced, Joker had a big opening weekend with $93.5 million coming from U.S. audiences, in addition to $140.5 million internationally.