Warner Bros. is going all in on Harley Quinn.
The Hollywood Reporter revealed yesterday that Australian actress Margot Robbie has signed a first-look deal with Warner Bros. that includes a Suicide Squad spinoff for her character Harley Quinn (and other DC Comics heroines).
The project was originally reported in May, with claims that Robbie was the driving force for the project. Apparently, when she landed the part for Suicide Squad, she heavily researched the comics to learn as much as possible about the character. In the process, she reportedly became a fan of DC’s female characters. Robbie brought on the female writer to help develop the project and brought it to Warner Bros.
Robbie will develop and produce feature films through her LuckyChap Entertainment banner. Producing and developing with Robbie will be her LuckyChap partners Tom Ackerley, Josey McNamara and Sophia Kerr.
According to the article, Robbie and LuckyChap are in postproduction on their first movie as producers, a neo noir thriller called Terminal. In addition, LuckyChap is developing and producing a Tonya Harding biopic, I, Tonya, where Robbie will play the disgraced figure skater, and is developing an adaptation of Bad Monkeys, a novel by Matt Ruff, along with Bluegrass Films’ Scott Stuber and Dylan Clark for Universal Pictures.
Robbie, 26, best known as Naomi Lapaglia in the 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street and as Laura Cameron on the short-lived ABC television series Pan Am. Her other films include The Big Short, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, and The Legend of Tarzan.
Created in 1992 by Paul Dini and Bruce Timm, Harley Quinn first appeared in the Batman: The Animated Series episode "Joker's Favor," voiced by Arleen Sorkin. Initially intended as a female sidekick for The Joker, Harley quickly became popular with fans and the character was developed further. In the 1994 DC Comics graphic novel The Batman Adventures: Mad Love, Quinn received her origin story, revealing her as Dr. Harleen Quinzel, a psychiatrist at Arkham Asylum who fell in love with the Joker and turned to a life of crime in order to be with him.
The character's first comic book appearance was in 1993's The Batman Adventures #12, but Harley's growing popularity encouraged DC Comics to bring her into official Batman canon starting with Batman (vol.1) #570 in 1999. She soon received her first ongoing series in 2001 that ran for 38 issues and was made a member of the Suicide Squad starting with 2011's Suicide Squad (vol.4) #1. Harley received her second ongoing series in 2013 and her third in 2016 as part of DC Comics' relaunch known as Rebirth.