Lady Gaga‘s upcoming film Joker: Folie À Deux is a musical of sorts, but Gaga says fans shouldn’t expect A Star Is Born-quality vocals from her this time around.

Speaking to Empire magazine, Gaga says of her character, Harley Quinn, who she refers to as “Lee,” “There’s plenty of bum notes, actually, from Lee. I’m a trained singer, right? So even my breathing was different when I sang as Lee.”

“When I breathe to sing on stage, I have this very controlled way to make sure that I’m on pitch and it’s sustained at the right rhythm and amount of time, but Lee would never know how to do any of that,” she explains. “So it’s like removing the technicality of the whole thing … I worked a lot on the way that I sang to come from Lee, and to not come from me as a performer.”

Gaga also says the way the movie incorporates music — having it be “an extension of the dialogue,” as she puts it — is “unlike anything I’ve ever done before.”

Joker: Folie À Deux, co-starring Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck/Joker, comes to theaters in October but will have its premiere at the Venice Film Festival, which runs from the end of August to the beginning of September.

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