‘Just joy’: Greta Gerwig discusses reaction to Barbie at London film festival
Greta Gerwig has spoken of her “thrill” at the “incredible reaction” to Barbie, her existential comedy and the runaway hit film of the year.
Talking to Succession and Peep Show co-creator Jesse Armstrong at an audience during the London film festival at the BFI Southbank, Gerwig, 40, recalled standing covertly at the back of cinemas in New York during the film’s opening weekend, asking the projectors to “turn up the volume” and being “so moved” by the warmth of audience response.
“The process of making it was just joy,” said Gerwig. “I don’t know if it was the pink or the music but it was just infectious.” Yet the most gratifying aspect, she said, was seeing strangers watch the film and realising that “the song that’s in my heart is in other people’s hearts”.
Barbie stars Margot Robbie as a “stereotypical Barbie” in a hyperreal Barbieland populated by remorselessly cheerful and immaculate dolls and their dim boyfriends, of which Ryan Gosling’s Ken is the key player. Robbie, who also acts as producer, recruited Gerwig to the project, which Gerwig co-wrote with her partner, Noah Baumbach, during lockdown in 2020. The film was shot two years later, mostly in Leavesden studios outside London.
Barbie was released this July and is the highest-grossing film of the year, with no sign of being surpassed. Its global box office total stands at $1.43bn (£1.17bn) – about 10 times its budget. Among the records the film has broken are the best-performing film ever made by a solo female director; the 14th highest-grossing film of all time; and the most lucrative cinema release ever for Warner Bros (whose previous titles include the Harry Potter series).
Gerwig revealed her fears that both the concept and the specificity of reference might alienate audiences and dissuade studios from backing the project. Yet asked about the nod to the BBC’s 1995 mini-series adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, which “Depression Barbie” is seen binge-watching while sitting in tracksuit bottoms, eating sweets and scrolling through Instagram, Gerwig said “that callout was entirely for me”.
She then thanked the BBC and the show’s stars for allowing her film to show a brief clip. “I was very honoured,” she said. “It was a big deal. Thank you to Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth; that was very lovely.”
Gerwig also discussed her previous two films as solo director: coming-ofage story Lady Bird, and an adaptation of the Louisa May Alcott classic Little Women, as well as 2012’s Frances Ha, which she co-scripted with Baumbach, who directs. Gerwig stars in the film as a flighty and directionless dancer, and – although she has since taken small roles in films – said she was uncertain whether she would be able to step back in front of the camera for a prolonged spell.
“I don’t know if I could any more. You get into a particular zone. I’d love to be able to do it again but I feel out of that headspace now.”
Gerwig also disclosed how painful she found the writing process, likening it to amputating a toe with her laptop. “I like working in public, but at some point it felt like performance art: ‘Here I am! Writing my screenplay!’”
“This is what happens when we have leading voices like Donald Trump and Vivek Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis signaling retreat from America’s role as leader of the free world. What happened in Ukraine was an unprovoked invasion by Russia, what happened this weekend was an unprovoked invasion by Hamas into Israel,” he said.
Top Republicans also lambasted their party peers for the vacuum in leadership in the House of Representatives at such a critical moment. Last week Kevin McCarthy was ousted as speaker of the House by the hardright flank of the party, and a replacement has yet to be found.
Another presidential hopeful, the former governor of New Jersey Chris Christie, said that the outbreak of fighting in the Middle East had made a bad business on Capitol Hill worse. “The actions taken by some members of my party were wholly irresponsible without this going on, they’re now putting an even brighter light on the irresponsibility of not having someone in place,” he told ABC’s This Week.
Michael McCaul, the Republican chair of the House foreign affairs committee, also lamented the absence of leadership. “It wasn’t my idea to oust the speaker,” he told CNN.
“I thought it was dangerous. What kind of message are we sending to our adversaries when we can’t govern, when we are dysfunctional, when we don’t even have a speaker of the House. That’s a terrible message.”