Greta Gerwig is giving further insight into “I’m Just Ken,” one of the many hit songs from her record-breaking film, Barbie.
During an appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, the three-time Oscar nominee shared that Ryan Gosling, who plays Ken in the box office sensation, originally envisioned a battle between him and his now-famous mink coat.
“One of the ideas Ryan had was that he would have a dance duet with his mink and that the mink would be fighting him and then love him and then fight him again, eventually defeat him, and that he would be birthed anew out of the mink,” she shared of Gosling’s idea. “And somewhere there’s a rehearsal footage of this.”
While that scene didn’t end up making it into the iconic number in the movie, Gosling and the rest of the cast bringing forward all of their “brilliant, wild ideas” allowed for the film to be what it became.
“We had a fun week exploring what it would be if he had his mink ballet,” the director added, explaining that she and Gosling got the idea for the mink coat from the fact that they are both big fans of Sylvester Stallone, who wore big, extravagant coats in the ’80s.
Elsewhere in her late night appearance, Gerwig explained that, in every draft of Barbie, she wrote Ken’s character with Gosling in mind, but it took the two-time Oscar nominee a little longer to see himself as the lead Ken, opposite Margot Robbie’s Barbie.
“He’s an amazing, genius actor, dramatic actor, everything,” the director said. “I always knew he was extremely funny. I mean he is extremely funny in lots of movies but also his SNL appearances. He’s one of the great all-time SNL hosts. I said, ‘I’ve written this for you,’ and he eventually agreed with me.’”
Gerwig co-wrote the Barbie script with her partner, Noah Baumbach, who she said didn’t exactly know they would be working on this film together until the news broke in the trades. When the story came out that they were going to collaborate on it, Gerwig shared that he sent her the link with a question mark and she replied, “Oh, whoops.”
Barbie is now streaming on Max.
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