Mattel’s Barbie was the first plastic fashion doll sold to children in the U.S., although she quickly gained popularity across the globe. Creator Ruth Handler drew inspiration from her daughter Barbie’s (yes, that was her name) love of paper dolls, which depicted grown women wearing then-modern fashions as opposed to plastic baby dolls. (Handler also drew inspiration from the German Bild Lilli doll, which was similar to early Barbies but was actually intended as a racy gag gift for adult men!)
The real Barbie Handler would spend hours playing with her paper dolls while ignoring all of her various baby dolls. And that bit of minutia, only we nerdy Barbie fanatics know, is the foundation for the teaser trailer for Greta Gerwig’s Barbie movie, which stars Margot Robbie in the lead role. That, along with Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.
That tracks, right? Check out the trailer:
Previous images of Robbie as Barbie and Ryan Gosling as Ken have leaned into the 1980s and ’90s but, as you can see in this trailer, Robbie perfectly embodies the original Barbie doll in her iconic black and white striped bathing suit. Hopefully, the film will span Barbie’s full history of fashion… as horrific as some of it is.
Joining Robbie and Gosling in the cast are Will Ferrell, Emma Mackey, Connor Swindells, Nicola Coughlan, Emerald Fennell, Kate McKinnon, Michael Cera, Simu Liu, America Ferrera, Ncuti Gatwa, Issa Rae, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Rhea Perlman, Sharon Rooney, Scott Evans, Ana Cruz Kayne, Ritu Arya, Hari Neff, Alexandra Shipp, and Jamie Demetriou.
Gatwa, who is the new Doctor Who, previously starred in the Netflix series Sex Education in which Swindells played his love interest. It will be interesting to see them reunited in different roles. In Barbie, rumor has it, Gatwa is playing “Black Ken” while Simu Liu is playing “Asian Ken.” Both are briefly glimpsed in the trailer. No word on Swindells’ role. The same is true for most of the rest of the cast.
Can a live-action Barbie movie deliver in a satirical way similar to the way that The LEGO Movie managed to appeal to audiences of all ages? We’ll find out when you leave your Dream House on July 21, 2023, when Barbie opens in theaters!
