Ryan Gosling (La La Land) came back to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Thursday night for the first time in over 10 years to talk about his role as Ken, Barbie’s boyfriend, in the upcoming Barbie movie starring Margot Robbie (Suicide Squad).
Greta Gerwig, the director, and co-writer offered him the role of Ken, and Ryan Gosling said that the script, written by Gerwig and Noah Baumbach, was the “best script I’ve ever read.”
But he decided to take the part only after he went into his backyard to “think about it” and found a Ken doll “face-down in the mud next to a squished lemon.” He took a picture and sent it to Gerwig with the message, “I’ll be your Ken. Because his story needs to be told.”
Ken’s lack of attention was also talked about earlier in the interview. Gosling was surprised by how some people reacted to the photo of him as Ken that went viral and, as Fallon put it, “broke the Internet.” “It’s not like they had ever thought about Ken before this. They never considered Ken… He’s just a prop, and he’s not even a cool one.” Fallon also said, “Ken, the underappreciated character…” He could be reached. He didn’t leave the toy box.
Ken doesn’t have any kind of backstory, like a job or a place to live, so fans can look forward to seeing this character finally get some attention.
The movie from Warner Bros. will come out on July 21, 2023.
Robbie and Tom Ackerley are producing through their company, LuckyChap Entertainment, along with Robbie Brenner of Mattel and David Heyman of Heyday Films. As executive producers, Josey McNamara of LuckyChap and Ynon Kreiz of Mattel are in charge. America Ferrera, Simu Liu, Kate McKinnon, Ariana Greenblatt, Alexandra Shipp, Emma Mackey, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Issa Rae, Michael Cera, Rhea Perlman, and Will Ferrell are among the other cast members.