Jared Leto and his method acting antics have become the stuff of legend and it seems like he alleged techniques to the craft while doing 2016's Suicide Squad took on a life of their own. There were claims that the actor, in preparation to play Joker in the film, mailed his co-stars used condoms, and even gifted a dead rat to Margot Robbie, who played Harley Quinn in the movie. Seeing how these stories have gotten out of hand, Leto is debunking at least one of the alleged tales during a recent interview with "GQ."
Leto flat out denied giving Robbie a dead rat while making the film and what he actually gave her was something far more sensible and delicious:
"It's also interesting how this stuff all takes on a life of its own. But I never gave Margot Robbie a dead rat, that's just not true. I actually gave her a lot of… I found this place in Toronto that had great vegan cinnamon buns, and that was a very common thing."
There you have it, folks. Leto never did anything as weird as sending Robbie a dead rat and actually pointed her in the direction of some great cinnamon buns in the Toronto area. A cinnamon bun haven doesn't grab as many headlines as a dead rat so maybe that's how this story somehow got spun into something that was way more bizarre. He didn't debunk the stories about sending his co-stars used condoms so that weird method acting story still exists for fans to mull over.
Leto is no stranger to going to great lengths to get inside the mind of a character. The actor lived on the streets to prepare for his role as a junkie in Requiem for a Dream and he permanently hurt his health by putting on excess weight in Chapter 27. Leto has commented on his method acting techniques before and he says he does it to overprepare for his roles:
"I appreciate the term [method acting], I think it's a little cloudy, the definition. And it, it could also be really pretentious as well. I was thinking of it as my job to show up and do the best work that I can. It's my job to show up, do whatever I can, to be overprepared. And to deliver. It's also my job to show up and, you know, be a pleasure to work with. And, and, and, and to be collaborative, and to have a good experience on set."
Jared Leto's Joker returns in Zack Snyder's Justice League and Snyder included the character in the new cut because fans never got to see his Joker in a scene with Ben Affleck's Batman. Because of all the on-set Suicide Squad stories surrounding Leto and a role that was clearly trimmed down significantly from what was originally intended, the actor received mixed reviews for his take on the character. Snyder recently spoke as to why the new Joker scene was included and perhaps it will redeem Leto's portrayal of the character with the fans:
"The cool thing about the scene is that it's Joker talking directly to Batman about Batman. It's Joker analyzing Batman about who he is and what he is. That's the thing I also felt like fans deserved from the DC Universe. That is to say, the Jared Leto Joker and the Ben Affleck Batman, they never really got together. It seemed uncool to me that we would make it all the way through this incarnation of Batman and Joker without seeing them come together… The scene explains why Bruce had the Joker card taped to his gun that you see in Batman v Superman."
Did YOU believe some of the Suicide Squad method actor stories surrounding Jared Leto?