Greta Gerwig dazzled London audiences last night at a special live London Film Festival (LFF) event in which she lifted the curtain on the making of the year’s biggest film.
Speaking to Succession and Peep Show co-creator Jesse Armstrong, the acclaimed director talked about her stellar career, while honing in on the creation of Barbie.
“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.”
During the conversation, Gerwig said that her favourite part of the entire process was slipping into cinemas in New York to get a glimpse of audiences watching the film: it made her understand that “the song that’s in my heart is in other people’s hearts”. Gerwig added that on one occasion, during the film’s opening weekend, she asked staff to “turn up the volume” to make sure the screening was perfect.
Gerwig also spoke about the film’s reference to the BBC’s 1995’s Pride and Prejudice drama: Barbie gets depressed and plans to binge-watch the series, again. “That callout was entirely for me,” Gerwig laughed.
Speaking about being permitted to include a clip of the classic period drama in her blockbuster, she said: “It was a big deal. Thank you to Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth; that was very lovely.”
The conversation took place as part of BFI Screen Talks, a series of in-depth interviews with high-profile directors that are scheduled as part of LFF. Emerald Fennell, Martin Scorsese and Kitty Green have already given talks as part of this year’s programme; Andrew Haigh and Lulu Wang will be speaking this week.
Barbie has made more than $1.4 billion so far, making it the highest-grossing film of the year, and the 14th highest-grossing film of all time. The film’s success also marks Gerwig as the first solo female director to make a billion-dollar movie (Jennifer Lee was the first woman to cross the billion dollar mark, co-directing 2013’s Frozen with Chris Buck, and Anne Boden was the second, directing 2019’s Captain Marvel with Ryan Fleck).
Gerwig, who gave birth to her second child earlier this year, spoke at the event about the chances of returning to acting. Gerwig has acted in 29 films since 2006, the most famous of which include Baghead, Greenberg, Frances Ha, Isle of Dogs and White Noise.
“I don’t know if I could any more. You get into a particular zone,” she said. “I’d love to be able to do it again but I feel out of that headspace now.”
