20 facts you might not know about 'Barbie'

Cannon Films, those titans of ‘80s schlock, evidently had a Barbie movie in the works in the 1980s. How far along the project got is unknown, though a brief synopsis was released. Cannon was behind the Masters of the Universe flop, which led Mattel to nix any future projects with the company.

After the Cannon idea died a swift death, live-action Barbie reemerged conceptually in 2009 with Universal. The path to Barbie as we know it began there. Nothing came to pass at Universal, with the project moving to Sony in 2014. It got closer there but once again did not bear fruit. Sony’s option expired in 2018 when Warner Bros. grabbed the Barbie rights.

The first actor known to be attached to the project in any real way is Amy Schumer, who also took a pass at the screenplay with Sony. Schumer was not happy with the production, though, and backed out. Then, Anne Hathaway was in the picture, but she also did not end up in the role. Ultimately, Margot Robbie would be cast.

Robbie was not merely cast to act in Barbie. She was also a producer on the film and, in fact, pitched the project to Warner Bros. herself. Evidently, Robbie compared the project to Jurassic Park and may have joked that it would make a billion dollars.

After seeing Little Women, Robbie wanted Greta Gerwig to write the script for Barbie. Gerwig agreed, but with a caveat, as she was busy with another project. She wanted to work with her frequent creative partner (and longtime romantic partner), Noah Baumbach. The two wrote together, and Gerwig joined on to direct as well.

Gerwig hoped to get two of her regular collaborators, Timothee Chalamet and Saoirse Ronan, in the film with cameos, but neither was available. Meanwhile, Robbie was hoping Gal Gadot would play a Barbie, but she also had a conflict.

Michael Cera playing Allan certainly feels like strong casting, but he was not the first choice. Jonathan Groff was offered the role, but he turned it down.

Robbie was already in line to star as Barbie, but Barbie takes place in a world of Barbies and Kens (with the occasional Allan or Skipper), so multiples were needed. In terms of potential Kens that didn’t end up in the movie, Bowen Yang, Dan Levy, and Ben Platt were all in the mix but didn’t end up in the film.

For the small role of El Esposo de Gloria, i.e., Gloria’s husband, Ryan Piers Williams was cast. It was presumably an easy enough choice. In addition to being a writer, director, and actor, Williams has been married to America Ferrara since 2011, and Ferrara plays Gloria.

Gerwig got some polarizing attention for her list of inspirations for Barbie, throwing out seemingly every high-culture work of art conceivable. In terms of the look of Barbieland and the Dreamhouses, Gerwig did reference An American in Paris — and also Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. She eschewed CGI, even for stuff like the sky and the mountains. Gerwig wanted Barbie to feel tactile because “toys are, above all, things you touch" (h/t Architectural Digest).

Pink is a prominent color in Barbie. You may have noticed that. The set made extensive use of a specific shade of pink, officially classified as Pantone 219. However, due to supply chain issues and stock damaged by freezing temperatures, Pantone only had so much of this particular pink. Barbie used up the remaining Pantone 219 that was in stock at the time.

Barbie and her doll brethren have had a lot of interesting looks over time, some of which were replicated in the movie. If you think Barbie and Ken’s cowboy outfits or roller skating outfits are a bit much, you can blame Western Stampin’ Barbie and Hot Skatin’ Barbie, two doll designs from the 1990s.

If you are looking for a star-studded soundtrack, look no further than Barbie . Nicki Minaj, Dua Lipa, and Billie Eilish are among the notable artists in the mix. Missing, though, is Aqua’s “Barbie Girl.” Many assumed the ‘90s-indebted film would surely feature that hit song, but Mattel’s lawsuits over “Barbie Girl” back in the day may have doomed that. Instead, Minaj and Ice Spice’s “Barbie World” samples Aqua’s song, so they get a co-writing credit.

Gerwig knows her way around an entertaining needle drop. She pulled it off with “Crash into Me” by Dave Matthews Band in Lady Bird, and in Barbie, she arguably pulled it off with both “Closer to Fine” by Indigo Girls and “Push” by Matchbox Twenty. The latter, absurdly, became an anthem to blithely unaware Ken. Gerwig included “Crash into Me” in Lady Bird because it was a significant song from her own youth, and while some assumed she was condemning “Push,” that was not the case. In clarifying this, Gerwig called herself a fan of Matchbox Twenty and noted, “I never put anything in a movie I don't love" (h/t IndieWire).

Warner Bros. went all out in hyping people for Barbie. In trying to make it clear that this PG-13 film from the director of Lady Bird was not some silly movie for children (though the number of young children you may have seen in your local movie theater would indicate many parents something remained ignorant of this fact). The budget for Barbie was $145 million, which was far from bare bones, but the marketing budget was a reported $150 million. Did this include a burger with pink buns at a fast-food chain in Australia? You bet!

In addition to accidentally starting controversy over territorial disputes in the South China Sea, Barbie raised anger across the Middle East. There was concern among some (mostly of the authoritarian government ilk) about the film promoting homosexuality and, in the words of an Algerian official, “other Western deviances.” Indeed, the film would be banned in Algeria and Kuwait but overcome attempts to ban it in Pakistan and Lebanon.

As the easier sell of the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon, Barbie became a massive success. It would sit atop the domestic box office for four weeks, extra impressive for a summer film. Barbie would end up taking in $636 million domestically and $1.442 billion worldwide, making it the highest-grossing film on both fronts.

Barbie breaking the record for the biggest opening weekend for a movie that isn’t a sequel, remake, or superhero film is a little dubious. This was a Barbie movie, after all. It’s as steeped in intellectual property as anything. However, it is also the highest-grossing live-action comedy, both domestically and worldwide, and the highest-grossing film by a solo female director.

We have yet to get to the nominations for the major acting awards, but Barbie has plenty of award nominations already. It also has a win for Best Teaser from the Golden Trailer Awards. The Gotham Awards gave Ryan Gosling a supporting nomination, but the music world has really taken to Barbie. The MTV VMAS gave it five nominations, and the Grammys gave it a whopping 12 nominations. Notably, when the Oscars rolled around, both Gerwig and Robbie were not nominated, but Gosling was. The film took home one Academy Award, for Best Original Song.

Were you hoping the massive success of Barbie would allow Gerwig to make movies like Lady Bird to her heart’s content? Well, prepare to be disappointed. Around the time Barbie was hitting theaters, it was announced she would write and direct two adaptations from C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia series. At the time, her agent said that Gerwig wanted to be a “big studio director” and was “looking to move beyond the small-scale dramas she was known for.” So yeah, another Lady Bird is probably not in the works.