Barbie has been a pop culture mainstay for over 50 years now, but the toy brand is experiencing a resurgence thanks to the Barbie movie starring Margot Robbie that’s just a month away from release. Of course, while Robbie’s take on the famed doll will be leading the show, we’ll meet various other Barbies along the way, as well as plenty of Kens, with the main one being played by Ryan Gosling. In fact, this 2023 new movie release may just be Ken’s biggest platform to shine yet, so much so that it’s delightful that ‘Ken-ergy’ has become an adjective.
The existence of this term was brought up while Margot Robbie and her costars Kate McKinnon, Issa Rae and American Ferrera chatted with Fandango’s Nat Perez. The correspondent brought up how “Barbie” was once used as a negative connotation, like for the “cool girl with pretty clothes” characters in movies. With the Barbie movie coming up, Perez mused that “He’s such a Ken” will start to be said, and she then asked the actresses how one can spot a Ken in everyday life. Robbie brought up how producers Tom Ackerly (her husband) and David Heyman exemplified Ken-ergy:
When David and Tom would start talking about Bitcoin or something, Greta and I would be like 'They're being such Kens.' They'll talk about golf, we'll be like 'stop being Kens.' It's hard to define what makes a Ken. But there can also be big Ken energy and that's a good thing.
I’m not terribly familiar with Barbie since I didn’t play with those dolls growing up, but I think I know what Margot Robbie’s going for with her description of Ken-ergy. Getting too deep into a conversation on cryptocurrency or golf falls too far on the negative end of the spectrum, but there are also positive examples of Ken-ergy, like, if I had to provide my own example, perhaps a boyfriend cheering their partner on during an event. Basically, there’s dictionary definition of Ken-ergy, but, as Robbie then laid out, one can instantly recognize it whenever it emerges:
Ken-ergy, it’s not something you can define, it's just something you can sense and you know it.
For Issa Rae, who plays President Barbie, a Ken is just “kinda there” and a “great accessory,” which led to her talking about how she liked seeing the Kens in supportive roles. Kate McKinnon, who plays Weird Barbie, didn’t quite articulate her thoughts on what makes a Ken, but because she goes far back with director and co-writer Greta Gerwig, she was confident the Little Women helmer was right for this project. As for America Ferrera, she’s appearing in the movie as Gloria, a Mattel employee who, as we saw in the Barbie trailer released in late May, is perplexed by Margot Robbie’s Barbie being in the real world. However, judging by the April Barbie trailer, Gloria will be sneaking into Barbie Land, so it shouldn’t take her long for her to detect Ken-ergy.
Barbie’s extensive cast also includes people like Alexandra Shipp, Due Lipa, Simu Liu, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Ncuti Gatwa, John Cena, Will Ferrell and Michael Cera, to name a few. Even with just a handful of weeks to go until its release, fans are still finding new things to get obsessed about with this flick, like the way Margot Robbie’s hand is placed on a car steering wheel in the Barbie poster and Barbie Land not having any water. Once the movie is out, we’ll all need to keep our ears open and pay attention to if Ken-ergy does indeed catch on in the zeitgeist.
Barbie hits theaters on July 21, the same day as Oppenheimer, a movie that also boasts a ridiculously large cast. Since the former is a Warner Bros. Picture, count on it eventually being available to stream with a Max subscription.
