But it may have been a slightly different film if Greta had listened to studio executives, who she said told her to cut the scene where Barbie meets an older woman.
“I love that scene so much,” Greta told Rolling Stone. “And the older woman on the bench is the costume designer Ann Roth. She’s a legend.”
“It’s a cul-de-sac of a moment in a way — it doesn’t lead anywhere.
“And in early cuts, looking at the movie, it was suggested, ‘Well, you could cut it. And actually, the story would move on just the same.'”
But Greta wasn’t having it. “I said, ‘If I cut the scene, I don’t know what this movie is about,”‘ she continued. “To me, this is the heart of the movie. The way Margot plays that moment is so gentle and so unforced.”
“There’s the more outrageous elements in the movie that people say, ‘Oh, my God, I can’t believe Mattel let you do this,’ or, ‘I can’t believe Warner Bros. let you do this.’ But to me, the part that I can’t believe that is still in the movie is this little cul-de-sac that doesn’t lead anywhere — except for, it’s the heart of the movie.”
I love the way she explains her rationale for including the scene. It makes perfect sense.
You can read her full interview with Rolling Stone here.