Lady Gaga reveals mental health struggles shaped Harley Quinn role

Lady Gaga, in an interview with "Vogue", confessed that her personal experiences with mental health helped her prepare for the role of Harley Quinn. The singer and actress played the aforementioned character in the much-anticipated film "Joker: Folie à Deux", directed by Todd Phillips, where she starred alongside Joaquin Phoenix.

"Harley Quinn is a character that people know well from pop culture. Creating her, I had different thoughts. I based her on my experiences with mania and inner chaos," she confessed in an interview with the magazine. The artist took this opportunity to note the stereotypical perception of women as emotional and unpredictable, when they are simply emotionally overloaded.

Lady Gaga knows exactly what she is talking about. Several years ago, she began sharing information about her mental health issues. The first depressive episodes occurred when she was still a teenager. At the age of 17, she was raped by a music producer. "I tried to erase it from my memory. But it came back to me. It was like a huge, hideous monster," she revealed in one of the interviews. She was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. She increasingly experienced panic attacks accompanied by whole-body pain and stiffness. After years, she was diagnosed with fibromyalgia - a rheumatic disease that often develops in people who experienced trauma at a young age.

The artist has a history of self-harm. She does not hide that she also had suicidal thoughts. All of these difficult experiences help her today to embody new characters.

Besides working on "Joker: Folie à Deux", Lady Gaga has also been working on new music recently. The first single from the new album is set to be released in October. The premiere of "Joker: Folie à Deux" is scheduled for 4 October. Gaga wants her fans to know about the happiness and health she has found after the difficult years.