Mark Hamill’s Joker May Have Never Happened If It Wasn’t for Michael Keaton’s Batman

Mark Hamill has admitted that his role as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series may never have happened if it wasn’t for Michael Keaton’s caped crusader.

Hamill sat down with Wired to answer the web’s most searched questions about himself, including one about how he secured the role of the Joker. He explained that the controversy around Keaton’s casting in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman movie inspired him to try out for the role.

“There was this big outcry that Michael Keaton was going to play Batman,” Hamill recalled. “‘Oh, he’s Mr. Mom, he’s a comedy actor.’ I mean, they hadn’t even seen him, and they didn’t realize how great he would become. But there was great controversy.

“So, when I went in, I thought, ‘You think they’re going to hire Luke Skywalker to play the Joker? The fans will lose their minds!’ I was so sure that I couldn’t be cast, I was completely relaxed,” he said, explaining that this approach alleviated any performance anxiety.

“I knew I couldn’t get the part, so, who cares?” the actor noted. “And I drove out of the parking lot thinking, ‘That’s the best Joker they’ll ever hear, and it’s too bad they can’t cast me.’ And as soon as they did cast me, it reversed. I was like, ‘Oh no, I can’t do this!'”

In the years since, Hamill has voiced the Joker in various DC Comics projects, starting with Batman: The Animated Series in 1992 and moving into multiple movies and spin-off series, as well as video games, including the likes of Batman: Arkham Asylum and Batman: Arkham City.

Hamill said the Joker has always been one of his favorite characters to play “because he’s insane, and because he’s insane, he’s never boring. It’s just fun to play a character who creates chaos wherever he goes.”

As for Keaton, he will be back on our screens as Batman in the upcoming DC movie The Flash opposite Ezra Miller. The film will open in theaters on June 16 with a “secret ending” that Warner Bros. is trying to keep under wraps by hosting only one premiere before its theatrical debut.

Adele Ankers-Range is a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. Follow her on Twitter.