The Batman/Trivia

The following are various trivia from the film The Batman.

Trivia

 * Robert Pattinson had to lie to Christopher Nolan about his audition because Robert Pattinson's audition/screentest took place while he was in rehearsals for shooting Tenet (2020) in Los Angeles in May 2019.
 * The Batman feature the first version of Batman to directly address the black eye makeup under the cowl.
 * Colin Farrell wears makeup and a fat suit for his role of the Penguin. The facial prosthetics were comprised of six pieces. In order to ensure there were no visible seams, crew members would shine harsh flashlights in his face before approving him to go to set.
 * Colin Farrell stated that he went to Starbucks to try out his prosthetics and makeup for the Penguin for the first time, and nobody recognized him despite getting a couple of stares from people.
 * Colin Farrell revealed his son was 'utterly horrified' at the sight of his transformation into Penguin during production.
 * Matt Reeves stated that his version of the Riddler was partly inspired by the infamous serial killer who operated in California in the late 1960s.
 * The last two punches in the train station scene where the victim is already unconscious when Batman says, "I'm vengeance!" were Robert Pattinson's idea and he improvised.
 * Zoë Kravitz and Robert Pattinson received the same advice from the predecessors of their roles (Michelle Pfeiffer and Christian Bale respectively): make sure you can go to the bathroom while in costume.
 * In Wayne Manor, there is a pedestal with a bust on top. This is a reference to the original Batman (1966) series where a similar Shakespeare bust was used as a device to trigger the opening to the Batcave.
 * Robert Pattinson auditioned for The Batman using Val Kilmer's original Batsuit from Batman Forever (1995). But because Pattinson's head didn't fit into Kilmer's cowl, he wore the one George Clooney wore in Batman & Robin (1997). Oddly enough, the former Batman Christian Bale also auditioned for Batman Begins (2005) using Val Kilmer's original Batsuit from Batman Forever (1995), but including Kilmer's cowl.
 * When asked if he had taken anything from the set, Robert Pattinson revealed that he repeatedly took socks that his character wears and Warner Bros. noticed: "I did get a lot of socks [from set]... I kept getting a talking to from Warner Bros. They'd say, 'You know, it's fine to have a few, but you take them every day. How many socks do you need, cause we've been shooting for a year?'"
 * At one point in the movie, Falcone refers to the Batman as "Zorro." In many versions of Batman's origins, the Wayne family was leaving a theater showing of Zorro when they were murdered. Zorro was acknowledged by Bob Kane and Bill Finger as one of the main influences for Batman.
 * When Ben Affleck was set to star and direct, the villain of the film would have been Deathstroke played by Joe Manganiello and the screenplay would have prominently featured Arkham Asylum. Matt Reeves had actually enjoyed the original script that Ben Affleck had been preparing, comparing it to a James Bond film. However, he opted not to use it as he wanted to make a more noir, detective-driven story and bring his own, completely new version to life.
 * The Batmobile in this film is a customized muscle car which Bruce built himself. This draws influence from the TV series Batman (1966), where a Lincoln Futura was modified into the Batmobile. Another influence were the 1970s "Batman" comics by Neal Adams, where the Batmobile was a fairly normal-looking car that Batman drove for stealth purposes.
 * Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz were friends for about a decade before being cast in this film. Matt Reeves said because of that, the two already had great chemistry and a natural connection right from the beginning of the shoot. Pattinson and Kravitz appeared very early on in Reeves' head as he was writing the screenplay.
 * The movie's working title was "Vengeance Splinter".
 * The inspiration for Bruce's Batcave is a New York City urban legend about a train station that exists below the Waldorf Astoria hotel. The station was purportedly built as a secret escape route out of the city for the visiting US president in the event of an emergency.
 * To allow Matt Reeves and Robert Pattinson to communicate on the set across the self-imposed COVID-19 barriers between them, they were both outfitted with earpieces and microphones.
 * Director Matt Reeves was "devastated" when Robert Pattinson was cast in Tenet (2020) because he thought it meant he wouldn't want to play Batman. Reeves was convinced that because Pattinson was doing only arthouse films at the time, if he's going to do a blockbuster, it would only be once. Reeves stated, "I was devastated. I wrote this script with Rob in mind. I wanted him to be my Batman. When he's doing a blockbuster with one of the definitive Batman filmmakers, I thought, 'Okay, so there goes that. He's not gonna want to be Batman.'" Luckily for Reeves, that wasn't the case and Pattinson was actually eager to portray the character of Batman.
 * Every time Batman approaches somebody to start a fight (or is preceded by the sounds of his footsteps out of the shadows), the sound of his footsteps mimics the main beats of the movie's theme: every fourth step is heavier/deeper in sound.
 * At 175 minutes, this is the longest Batman film to be premiered and the second longest comic book movie theatrically released, behind Avengers: Endgame (2019) (181 minutes).
 * During shooting, Matt Reeves would speak to Colin Farrell in between scenes. Farrell often carried on conversations with Reeves in character, answering as Oz rather than himself.
 * Bruce is shown out of costume during daylight, hiding his face with a helmet, scarf and a baseball cap (and wearing eyeshade). This is akin to Batman: Year One, where he made a point of never wearing the Batsuit except at night.
 * When Alfred is deciphering the first clue from the Riddler, he tells Bruce he's remembering back to his days in "the circus." This is likely a reference to the name given to MI6 Headquarters. Andy Serkis stated that in this version, Alfred Pennyworth was the security guard for Bruce's father, Thomas Wayne. He is also an excellent code breaker and an intelligence expert. Alfred is a former member of the MI6, the United Kingdom's counter-intelligence and security agency.
 * Colin Farrell stated that a recording of a NYC building caretaker from the 1980s inspired him for the voice of Penguin.
 * Director Matt Reeves stated that in the audition/screentest, he knew Robert Pattinson was going to be his Batman the moment he put on the black eye makeup in front of the mirror.
 * Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz both worked on the fight choreography months before and every day during the whole shoot.
 * According to Robert Pattinson, he was "f-ing furious" when the news leaked on May 16, 2019, that he was in negotiations to play the next Batman. Although he was the frontrunner for the role, he hadn't screen-tested for the role and wasn't actually cast yet.
 * Jonah Hill was approached for the role of the Penguin, but turned down the offer due to disagreements over the character. It was also rumoured that Hill wanted to portray the Riddler instead.
 * Composer Michael Giacchino wrote the main theme song "The Batman" before the movie even went into production and while Matt Reeves was still writing the script. Reeves listened to it for the first time in his car with producer Dylan Clark before they went onto the stage to do Robert Pattinson's screen-test (the one with the red lighting that was released in January 2020).
 * Matt Reeves cites the work of Batman artist Francesco Francavilla as an influence on the film's design (film-noirish and distinctly low-tech).
 * When the title character debuted in Detective Comics, he was billed as "*The* Batman". The article " the" was also used in the 1940s serials. The use of the word "the" had fallen out of favor by the 1960s. Although, it was revived for the 1970s serious re-imagining of the character by Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams.
 * When coming up with ideas for the first crime scene at the mayor's house, Robert Pattinson told director Matt Reeves that he wanted his movements as Batman to be like that of an apparition, or ghost. Reeves stated, "He moved like a ghost in that scene, and he moves like a ghost in much of the movie."