Todd Phillips praises Steve Coogan's work opposite Joaquin Phoenix in Joker: Folie a Deux

Todd Phillips loved watching Steve Coogan go “toe-to-toe” with Joaquin Phoenix in ‘Joker: Folie a Deux’.

The 53-year-old director picked the British comedian to play TV personality Paddy Meyers, who interviews Joaquin as Arthur Fleck in Arkham Asylum in the sequel.

Todd admits one of his favourite scenes in the the original 2019 'Joker' film is when Arthur is interviewed by Robert De Niro's Murray Franklin on his talk show, and he wanted Coogan's interaction with Phoenix to match it.

In an interview with HeyUGuys, Todd said: "It’s always interesting to me to put someone like Joaquin toe-to-toe essentially, literally with another actor, and you really want to put him across somebody great, you know.

“In the first movie, he had this nine-minute scene with Robert De Niro, right, and in this movie, it is a nine-minute scene essentially with Steve Coogan and to me, as a director, those are the fun ones to watch where you are like, ‘Oh boy, here we go. Let me see these two go at it.'"

Todd also praised Brendan Gleeson, 69, for his performance as Jackie Sullivan, an abusive guard at Arkham State Hospital.

He added: “Brendan is a world-class actor, and Steve Coogan can do anything. He’s just amazing to have around."

The ‘Hangover’ director admitted that he didn’t purposely seek to cast British and Irish talent in his movies but the two nations are widely considered by Hollywood to produce incredible actors.

He said: “A lot of directors I think feel this, some of our best actors come out of the UK but its not an intentional thing, of me going, ‘Ooh we want a British or an Irish actor.”

The ‘War Dogs’ director is also enthused about getting to work with Joaquin - who stars opposite Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn in the DC Comics film - again because it is “so helpful” to understand each other in order for both the director and the star to do their best work.

Todd said: “You develop a short-hand with each other that is just kind of so helpful, when making a movie, you kind of can complete each other’s sentences or thoughts about where a scene should go or where it's headed.”