Penske Media via Getty Images
Here’s hoping the Joker can take a joke.
Nikki Glaser ripped into “Joker 2” during her opening monologue at the 2025 Golden Globes Sunday night.
The comedian, 40,tee’d up two quips about the Joaquin Phoenix-Lady-Gaga-starring box office bomb, a musical sequel to 2019s “Joker,” with some light-hearted wise-cracks about another 2024 movie musical, “Wicked.”
“I did not know a lot about ‘Wicked’ going into this because I had friends in high school,” Glaser joked. “But I loved it. I loved it so much.”
“My boyfriend loved it. My boyfriend’s boyfriend really loved ‘Wicked,’” she continued, eliciting laughs from the audience gathered at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles.
“It was so much fun. It’s so much fun seeing a musical in the theater,” she added. “Some theaters had issues with the theaters. Some people said it was ruined because people were singing.”
She then turned to “Joker 2,” saying, “Some people complained it was ruined by the images on the screen and the sounds that accompanied them.”
Feigning remorse, she added, “I’m sorry, ‘Joker 2.’ Where is their table? Oh, they’re not here. That’s right.”
Officially titled “Joker: Folie à Deux,” “Joker 2” was a critical and commercial flop. The movie was not nominated for any awards Sunday.
“Wicked,” on the other hand, which is the first of two films adapting the hit Broadway musical of the same name, was nominated for four Golden Globes this year.
Helmed by “Crazy Rich Asians” director Jon M. Chu, the box office record-breaker was nominated for best picture, musical or comedy, best performance by a female actor in a musical or comedy (Cynthia Erivo) and best performance by a female actor in a supporting role in any motion picture (Ariana Grande), and in the cinematic and box office achievement category, now in its second year.
Before Sunday’s ceremony, Glaser hit comedy clubs to try out potential opening monologue material — including jokes about “Wicked.”
But the quips weren’t landing how she wanted them to, as she told The New York Times.
One joke that Glaser only got a lukewarm response from an audience at the Comedy Cellar in Manhattan: “‘Wicked’ proved that we love musicals about the origin story of a villain who wears a lot of makeup. ‘Joker 2’ proved that we also hate those same types of musicals.”
After testing another joke about “Wicked” star Jeff Goldblum being a bad singer flopped with comedy clubgoers, she held a 30-minute-long call with her writers to pitch “Wicked” bits.
But Glaser has previously made it clear she was a fan of the musical.
In a Dec. 18 TikTok posted by the Empire State Building’s official account, the Taylor Swift stan lip-synced Erivo’s rendition of the show’s beloved song “Defying Gravity” from atop the famous New York skyscraper.
“Defying Gravity (Nikki’s Version),” the Empire State Building captioned the video.
Glaser was announced as the host of this year’s Globes in August on the heels of a breakout year.
In May, she debuted her well-received HBO comedy special “Someday You’ll Die” (nominated for a Golden Globe Sunday night) and made headlines for her performance at Tom Brady’s Netflix roast for eviscerating the former NFL superstar.
A veteran roaster, Glaser has also appeared on the roasts of Alec Baldwin, Bruce Willis, and Rob Lowe.
Though many only became aware of Glaser in 2024, she has been hard at the comedy game for over a decade. The 2025 Golden Globes wasn’t Glaser’s first hosting gig. She has previously stepped into guest host “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” and hosted the “2021 MTV Movie & TV Awards: Unscripted,” along with a handful of reality TV dating shows, most notably “FBoy Island.”
Ahead of the Golden Globes, Glaser spoke about what she hoped audiences would take away from her performance.
“I hope they just come away from it thinking, ‘I want to see her host more things,’” she told CBS Philadelphia.
“You know, I’d like this to be a gig that I get to do for a couple of years. If they’d have me.”
She added, “I’ve had so much fun preparing for it. I really take it very seriously.”
“I just want everyone to have a really good time watching it and to feel like there’s some life breathed into these shows that can kind of drag on and feel a little bit like celebrating this elite class of people that no one really relates to.”
“I wanted to make it fun again,” she continued. “I love watching these award shows, so I just want to make a really good one. And I think that it’s not all up to me as the host, but a lot of it falls on me.”
“So that’s my goal is to just make it a really fun night of TV for families to watch together.”