Greta Gerwig revealed in a new interview with Rolling Stone that some “Barbie” set visitors made Margot Robbie feel “self-conscious” during filming when they interacted far more with her co-star, Ken actor Ryan Gosling, than they did with her. Gerwig was talking about the time the crew spent filming a rollerblading scene in Venice Beach. Set photos from the scene, featuring Robbie and Gosling in neon outfits, exploded on social media last summer during production.
“How Barbie operates in Barbieland is she’s entirely continuous with her environment,” Gerwig said. “Even the houses have no walls, because you never need to hide because there’s nothing to be ashamed of or embarrassed of. And suddenly finding yourself in the real world and wishing you could hide, that’s the essence of being human. But when we were actually shooting on Venice Beach, with Margot and Ryan in neon rollerblading outfits, it was fascinating because it was actually happening in front of us.”
“People would go by Ryan, high-five him, and say, ‘Awesome, Ryan, you look great!’ And they wouldn’t actually say anything to Margot,” Gerwig said. “They’d just look at her. It was just surreal. In that moment, she did feel self-conscious. And as the director, I wanted to protect her. But I also knew that the scene we were shooting had to be the scene where she felt exposed. And she was exposed, both as a celebrity and as a lady.”
Gerwig added, “To be fair, Ryan was like, ‘I wish I wasn’t wearing this vest.’ But it was a different kind of discomfort.”
The rollerblading outfits became one of the first viral sensations to emerge from the “Barbie” movie. Appearing on “The Tonight Show” last year, Robbie called the photo leaks “mortifying.”
“I can’t tell you how mortified we were, by the way,” Robbie said when host Jimmy Fallon showed the “Barbie” set photo to viewers. “We look like we’re like laughing and having fun, but we’re dying on the inside. Dying. I was like, this is the most humiliating moment of my life.”
When asked if she ever thought the “Barbie” set photos would dominate internet buzz the way they did, Robbie responded, “No! I mean, I knew that we had some exteriors to shoot in L.A. I knew once you were doing exteriors, you’re gonna get papped. There’s probably going to be a little crowd of people who are going to take notice because, you know, we stand out a little bit in those outfits. So I knew there was going to be a little bit of attention, and probably some photos would get out there, but not like it did.”
Robbie concluded, “It was like mad. It was like hundreds of people watching all the time.”
“Barbie” opens in theaters nationwide July 21 from Warner Bros.