Greta Gerwig Says She Has No Plans For a BARBIE Sequel at This Point, But The Studio Hopes To Launch a Franchise

Barbie director Greta Gerwig is enjoying the fruits of her labor this week after a huge weekend for her film, which made $162 million, breaking the opening weekend record for a female director. It then scored $26 million on its first Monday after release, setting a new Warner Bros. in-house record for the studio’s top Monday grosser.

Gerwig told The New York Times that watching her movie become a historic comedy blockbuster has been “so amazing.”

“I wanted to make something anarchic and wild and funny and cathartic. The idea that it’s actually being received that way, it’s sort of extraordinary.”

The Times asked Gerwig if Barbie is “the start of a franchise” or “a complete story with a definitive ending.” The director and co-writer gave no definitive answer but said she’s not thinking about a follow-up at this time.

“At this moment, it’s all I’ve got. I feel like that at the end of every movie, like I’ll never have another idea and everything I’ve ever wanted to do, I did. I wouldn’t want to squash anybody else’s dream but for me, at this moment, I’m at totally zero.”

As you might expect, Warner Bros. wants to launch a franchise and when speaking to Variety in a recent interview Mattel CEO Ynon Kreiz said the “ambition is to create film franchises,” but added:

“At the outset, we’re not saying, ‘Okay, let’s think already about movie two and three.’ Let’s get the first one right and make that a success. And if you do that, opportunities open up very quickly, once you establish the first movie as a successful representation of a franchise on the big screen.

“Successful movies lend themselves to more movies,” Kreiz continued. “Our ambition is to create film franchises.”

Gerwig also weighed in on the conservative backlash that has erupted over the movie. Prominent conservative figures like podcaster Matt Walsh have condemned Barbie as “the most aggressively anti-man, feminist propaganda fest ever put to film.” Ben Shapiro posted a viral video on social media in which he set Barbie dolls on fire with a barbecue lighter while railing against the movie. 

Did Gerwig anticipate the degree to which her film would anger right-wingers? “No, I didn’t,” she told The Times.

“Certainly, there’s a lot of passion. My hope for the movie is that it’s an invitation for everybody to be part of the party and let go of the things that aren’t necessarily serving us as either women or men. I hope that in all of that passion, if they see it or engage with it, it can give them some of the relief that it gave other people.”

In the face of conservative outrage, such media figures as Whoopi Goldberg have publicly defended the film.

“It’s a movie!” Goldberg exclaimed on recent The View episode. “It’s a movie about a doll! I thought y’all would be happy. [Barbie] has no genitalia, so there’s no sex involved. Ken has no genitalia, so he can’t — it’s a doll movie! And the kids know it’s colorful and it’s Barbie.”

I agree with Whoopi. It’s a freaking movie. And if a movie that expresses what it’s like to be a woman is perceived to be anti-man, then so be it.

Barbie is now playing in theaters nationwide from Warner Bros.

via: Variety