JOKER Casts Alec Baldwin as Batman's Father, Thomas Wayne

Remember that brief time in the '90s when Alec Baldwin could've been Batman and he became The Shadow instead?  Well, as it turns out...

The Hollywood Reporter has word that Todd Phillips' upcoming Joker origin movie starring Joaquin Phoenix has cast Alec Baldwin as DC Comics character Dr. Thomas Wayne, the father of Batman himself, Bruce Wayne.  In addition to Phoenix, Baldwin joins a cast that includes Robery De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Marc Maron, and Frances Conroy.

According to their sources, this version of Thomas Wayne will depict him as "a cheesy and tanned businessman who is more in the mold of a 1980s Donald Trump."

Baldwin, 60, is currently best known for his recurring impersonation of Donald Trump on the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live and for his appearances Alan Hunley in the action movies MIssion: Impossible--Rogue Nation and Mission: Impossible--Fallout.  Some of his other notable films include Beetlejuice, The Shadow, The Hunt for Red October, Glengarry Glen Ross, The Cooler, Ghosts of Mississippi, Pearl Harbor, The Aviator, The Departed, and The Good Shepherd.  In addition, he's known for playing Jack Donaghy on the NBC sitcom 30 Rock, and has appeared in episodes of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Will & Grace, Johnny Bravo, Friends, Clerks: The Animated Series, The Simpsons, and Knots Landing.

Created in 1939 by Bill Finger, Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson, Thomas Wayne first appeared in Detective Comics (vol.1) #33 as a gifted physician and philanthropist to Gotham City, who inherited the Wayne family fortune after Patrick Wayne.  In the maxi-series Batman: The Long Halloween, a flashback revealed that Thomas Wayne saved the life of gangster Carmine Falcone.  Falcone's father, Vincent Falcone, came to Wayne Manor and begged Thomas to save his dying son, who had been shot by rival gangster Luigi Maroni.  Thomas wanted to take the younger Falcone to the hospital, but Vincent insisted that nobody know about the shooting.  After saving Carmine's life, he was offered a reward or favor, but refused to accept any form of payment.

One night, when exiting a movie theatre, Thomas and his wife Martha Wayne were murdered by a mugger named Joe Chill, right in front of their son Bruce. This tragedy shocked Gotham and led to Park Row, the street where the murders occurred, being labeled Crime Alley.  The Wayne murders were the main cause of much of the corruption and crime in Gotham City.  Once it became clear that even wealthy, important people could be murdered so easily, citizens began to lose faith in the police, and the police themselves started to lose faith in their importance, leading to corruption within the force.  More importantly, however, the murders deeply affected Bruce as a child, later serving as the motivation for Bruce to eventually to fight crime as the superhero Batman.

Baldwin will be the sixth actor to portray Thomas Wayne on screen, after David Baxt in the 1989 film Batman, Michael Scranton in the film Batman Forever, Linus Roache in the film Batman Begins, Grayson McCouch in the Fox series Gotham, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan in the movie Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Joker is currently expected to arrive in theaters on October 4, 2019.