There’s been no shortage of topics to discuss surrounding Barbie, ranging from its all-star cast led by Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, to how it’s delightfully created the term ‘Ken-ergy.’ Additionally, just like with The Wolf of Wall Street, The Suicide Squad and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Barbie has refocused the public’s attention on Margot Robbie’s feet, as one of the movie’s plot points is how the actress’ eponymous character discovers her feet are going from arched to flat. It turns out there was discussion about CGI’ing Robbie’s feet, and Barbie director Greta Gerwig has shared how she reacted to that suggestion.
Gerwig and Robbie stopped by the Australian program The Project to chat about Barbie, during which time the latter reaffirmed that yes, those are her arched feet we see at the beginning of the latest Barbie trailer, though she had to hold onto a bar over eight takes in order to keep her balance while in that arched position. That led to Gerwig explaining how the CGI talks came up and were quickly dismissed:
There was a big discussion in the beginning. Everyone said, ‘Are you going to CGI all the feet?’ And I thought, ‘Oh God, that’s terrifying! No! That’s a nightmare.’ And I was like ‘[Margot] has the nicest feet.’ She has these beautiful dancer feet. She should just hang on to that bar and do it just like this.
Given how difficult it is to maintain feet in the arched position for an extended period of time, I don’t blame whomever suggested CGI be implemented for Margot Robbie’s comfort. But Greta Gerwig wasn’t having it, feeling that CGI feet would just look too weird, plus thought that Robbie’s feet looked too good not to show off on camera (the actress mentioned in the interview that she had a pedicure the day the aforementioned trailer moments was shot). It was likely for the best in the long run, as Barbie utilizing CGI feet could have been on a similar level of uncomfortable as if the Cats movie has released its Butthole Cut.
It worth noting, though, that not all of the feet shots we see from Barbie’s lead protagonist necessarily come from Margot Robbie. A 26-year-old named Emma Eastwood was hired to be Robbie’s body double, and among the things she had to do was walk up a set of stairs acting like her feet hurt, as well as lace facedown on the ground for an hour. Of course, body doubles being used in a Hollywood production is par for the course, and Robbie was surely relieved not to have to go through those scenes that Eastwood was hired to stand in for on her behalf.
Margot Robbie, and her feet, will shine again on the big screen when Barbie opens on July 21, the same day as Oppenheimer, another movie with a ridiculously large cast. Look through the 2023 release schedule to learn what other movies are left to come out this year.
