Greta Gerwig Revived 1950s Techniques to Create the World of ‘Barbie’ (2024)

Director Greta Gerwig instantly felt like the perfect fit to bring Barbie to life on screen as soon as her involvement in the film was announced. Both of her previous directorial projects — 2017's Ladybird and 2019's Little Women — well capture the distinct experience of girls' adolescence, so what better choice to helm a project that puts the spotlight on a powerhouse symbol of childhood and growing up than her? Sure enough, Gerwig's Barbie movie is phenomenal and the quality of the film is being rewarded big time at the box office.

With Barbie being a staple on toy shelves since 1959, Gerwig made the choice to utilize some era-appropriate filmmaking techniques for the Barbie Land scenes. During her chat with Collider's own Perri Nemiroff, Gerwig detailed how they captured the film's transportation scenes and discussed the extent of practical effects needed to accomplish them.

Hear all about that, why Barbie marks Gerwig's most terrifying project to date, and how the Barbie filmmaking experience prepared her for what's next in the video interview at the top of this article, or you can read the conversation in transcript form below:

PERRI NEMIROFF: I know you go after projects that terrify you. Is Barbie the most terrifying project you've done thus far?

GRETA GERWIG: Easily! Easily. So terrifying, yes.

So what is number two?

GERWIG: I mean, honestly, whatever project I'm working on feels like the most terrifying one. But yeah, it feels like -- god, I mean, they're all terrifying. But yeah, Barbie, it was totally terrifying, the whole time.

Is there a single scene or aspect of this movie that you were most nervous about executing the way that you wanted?

GERWIG: Everything about the way this movie was made was a giant question mark. It was like, I don't know how we're going to do all of this. I wanted to do practical builds for everything, and I also wanted, any time I could, to use whatever [the] film technique from 1959 was, so I needed to build the entire thing by miniature and then shoot the miniature, and then composite that into the image. I had to do everything practically. Like the entire transportation sequences, that's all practical builds. That all happens in camera.

And so everything had to be worked out. I spoke with Rodrigo Prieto, Sarah Greenwood, and Jacqueline Duran who are the DP, set designer, costume designer. I talked to them for a year before we were even in prep prep because we just didn't know how any of it was possible. Every day was this challenge of execution. But in a way, because I had this very clear vision that I wanted everything to be practical and in camera, it made it easy in terms of how we went about stuff. Like with the mermaids or something, it's like, well, if you were making a stage show, she'd be on almost like a seesaw rig. You wouldn't have a big jump up into the air and a tail flip and a splash. You would just rig her up and rig her down. And walking into that simplicity was part of it. So all of that. The set designers and figuring out all the houses and everything, it was an execution done so perfectly and I am so grateful to everyone who made it.

With everything you accomplished on this, going forward have you acquired a new filmmaking goal, or maybe does one of your goals feel more within reach because this movie exists?

GERWIG: Yes! Yes, yes. I mean, right now every time I've gone to make a film, there's always something challenging or a new aspect to it and this one it felt like I got -- it was like a level up. And also just learning how to execute something like this, how to work with certain constraints, the best way to realize certain visions, all of that. Everybody I think who's a director has a bit of a fantasy baseball team in their head of the movies they're gonna make in the future, and I have movies I want to make that are tiny and I have movies I want to make that are huge, but I knew that if I wanted to make some of these big canvas movies, you got to get the hours under your belt because you can't -- they can be totally overwhelming. So, it definitely makes me feel like, “Okay, now I feel slightly more prepared to maybe tackle the next thing.” But yeah, it's only new mistakes, only new challenges. I'm just so lucky that I get to do it.

Looking for more Barbie talk? Catch Perri's interview with America Ferrera below: