In the halcyon days of 2017, Anne Hathaway was attached to Sony’s Barbie movie. You’ll be surprised to hear it never came out.
Greta Gerwig’s Barbie might be one of the few bright spots on Warner Bros. accounts sheet this year, but once upon a time it was Sony that was eyeing up a stay at the dream house, with Anne Hathaway set to star.
In a recent interview with the Happy Sad Confused podcast, though, the Eileen actor seems pretty at piece with her lapsed shot at plastic stardom – and had some very nice things to say about Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie, too.
“What’s so exciting about what Greta and Margot and that phenomenal team [did] is they hit a bullseye,” she said. “The bullseye caused the entire world to reach this level of ecstasy. Now imagine that version … that much energy, that much anticipation, that much emotion… but it’s not the right version. I actually think of it as a lucky thing [it didn’t get made].”
“Margot is sublime,” Hathaway continued. “What she is doing as a creative person and a producer is so exciting and inspiring. The mythic giants they toppled with [Barbie] that have kept certain narratives in place that have not allowed opportunities to develop for so many people… they ran straight through it! Just as a cinemagoer and as a woman in Hollywood since I was a kid, I’m thrilled by the development. If I believed that the version I was attached to could have done that, I might feel differently about it, but I genuinely think their film was the best possible version. It’s easy just to be thrilled and happy [for them]. I love watching women kill it. To do so well, so undeniably that they actually had to write new records … come on! I think it will probably make things better.”
Hathaway wasn’t the first star attached to the ill-fated project, initially scheduled for release in 2018. Amy Schumer was Sony’s first choice for the lead role, and even worked on the script before leaving the project. At the time, she cited scheduling conflicts for the move, but more recently told the Hollywood Reporter the decision came down to that old chestnut, creative differences.
“They definitely didn’t want to do it the way I wanted to do it, the only way I was interested in doing it,” Schumer said last year. Hathaway was announced as the comedian’s replacement soon after, the project fell through, and Warner Bros. picked up the rights. The rest, as they say, is movie history.
