Barbie Unboxed: Behind the Scenes of Mattel’s First Foray into Feature Film with Catherine Frymark

Hi Barbies! Hi Ken.

Thank you.

Well, sure, and you're absolutely right. We have Mattel — this was our first theatrical film. For an 80-year-old company, it took us a while to bring Barbie to life on the big screen, and that takes a lot of partners. Even for me, as far along as I am in my career, I hadn't worked at a company that had launched its first film. So it was lifelong learning at its best. We're not a studio; Mattel is not a studio. We are and have been a toy company. So we work with a lot of partners. We worked with Warner Brothers Pictures, masterful film marketers that distributed the film; LuckyChap Productions, which is owned by Margot Robbie and her husband and business partner, who helped co-produce the film. From my point of view, previously Mattel had gone through quite a journey. At the time our current CEO took the role, he was the fourth CEO in four years, and Mattel was in a pretty tough spot and had never really commercialized its IP outside the toy aisle. It's not a new invention — Marvel started as a comic book publisher, Hasbro made Transformers, Lego makes a movie out of bricks — but for whatever reason, Mattel had dodged that. So starting with Barbie was the most complex of all: our biggest brand, our most lucrative brand, and one with quite a history, as you wrote in your case study. For me, this was the opportunity. We knew we had a good film on our hands, but how could we create a cultural event? And how, from a corporate communications lens, could we tell the story of our transformation through this incredible proof point? So that was my focus. Certainly, our partners at Warner Brothers were promoting the actors and putting Margot and Ryan on Kimmel and Fallon and doing a publicity tour. But for me, it was more of a message about Mattel's vision for films, the purpose behind our brands, the evolution of Barbie as a brand — which we can get into — and really that our toys resonate in other mediums beyond the physical toy.

Yeah, it's a great observation and question, Chloe. Honestly, I don't think we realized Mattel would be a third main character in the film until Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach's unbelievable script landed in inboxes. Our CEO likes to tell the story: this was deep in COVID, and the script lands in an inbox. Usually you get a treatment. In Hollywood, the studio and the filmmaker agree — the writer submits a treatment, get a sense of the story — and Greta submitted a poem and then went off and wrote a full script that very much ended up the movie that you saw. So that lands in our CEO's inbox, and it's just words on a page, and you see that Barbie's a fascist, your company is the worst in corporate America, and the CEO is a chauvinist buffoon. So to say that it took a leap of faith and trust is an understatement. But that's what we wanted to do. A lot of people ask us, 'How did you let them make this movie? You're making a mockery of yourself.' Well, we wanted them to make this movie. When you get someone like Greta Gerwig, who loves Barbie, and Margot Robbie, we wanted them to break convention because Barbie — your case study smartly went into the history — has some past. We had done a lot of work about 10 years ago. We started on a journey to evolve Barbie to become a toy and a brand that every girl could see themselves in. Now she's the most diverse doll line on the market: 100 different body shapes and styles and hair colors. This is all stuff that you know. So for us, we wanted to do something bold and unique because we knew that was the only way we were going to break through. It was a script that you can't just read; you have to read through it because the vision in Greta's mind — you couldn't see that; you had to trust it. Also, we embraced our history, but our boardroom doesn't look like that. As you know, 50% of our independent directors are women. We are a company made of women. So for us, I don't think I appreciated how big of a character Mattel would be and how well we would be perceived for just going with the flow and embracing the self-deprecation. That's been one of the great outcomes of the whole process.

Right. That was a huge part of this, and I think certainly led to the amplification and the ultimate success — box office success and consumer products success — of the film. There was a mix, just like we talked about all the partners and collaborators we had on the project. Barbie is 65 years old this year, and we have a long history before the movie ever came along of a lot of consumer products partnerships. We've done a ton of work with Bloomingdale's in the past; we've done a ton of other collaborations with different apparel and health and beauty partners. Warner Brothers is a master at this as well, and they brought to the table some other partners that were new to us, which were by and large great. I'll give an example of one that was a little bit beyond our wheelhouse. Warner Brothers brought us Bumble, and we had to think about that because Barbie is primarily and has been a children's brand. Every new partner that we looked at, we had to look for: does it align to our brand values? Is it so far outside the scope of what Barbie stands for? Is it jarring to the consumer or the parent of a child to have the brand associated there? Ultimately, we came up with a program that was a win-win-win for everyone. Similarly, Airbnb — not a partner before, and Warner Brothers brought that to us. So it broadened the aperture both for the viewer and the fan of Barbie, I think for years to come, but also our potential partners who looked at us in a different way through the lens of the film.

You know, it was a phenomenon on its own, Katrina. It was — we did see it happen organically, 100% right. That was consumer generated all the way. We watched it happen, and then we of course decided to figure out an appropriate strategy to get behind it. It really did start when it was announced that both films would land on the same opening weekend. That's not something that studios take lightly, going head-to-head on an opening weekend with two huge films. What we saw happening was excitement for viewers to go back to the theater. We saw a conversation — Warner Brothers was in the lead on this, as well as our social team — where we saw a conversation happening that we felt was positive, so we leaned in. But there were some cases where the subject matter, obviously you're dealing with Oppenheimer, which is highly sensitive historically. So we leaned in where we felt like we could and then sort of sat back and watched where we didn't. But the great thing about Barbenheimer was that return to the theaters. 20% of theatergoers to Barbie opening weekend hadn't been in a theater since pre-pandemic. Not only were they coming to the theaters, they were coming in the attire you're all wearing today that I'm wearing today, and even more. Many of you went to the theater and saw people dressed up in the rollerblading outfits, just really enjoying the experience of being together to watch a film. I don't know — I didn't follow it very closely — I'm not sure if anybody who went to Oppenheimer dressed up as much as they did for the Barbie movie. But it did bring people back to the cinema, and for that we were glad to support the industry and be part of Barbenheimer.

Yeah, it's a great question. When our CEO joined the company, one of the first calls he made was to CAA, Creative Arts Agency, that represents Margot Robbie, and started the conversation to bring Barbie to life. But in many ways, we didn't know that Barbie would be the first out of the gate. We had identified that as the first that we had focused on developing, but with director schedules and actor schedules, they sometimes linger on for years in development. But we had identified that same summer, 2018, a few pages of IP we thought could translate into films, and then quickly got behind announcing films. We've announced 15 other films in various stages of development and production. I think the lesson learned is working with the best and trusting them. Our CEO said something fairly surprising at his kickoff meeting for Barbie with Warner Brothers. He said, 'I don't care if this movie sells one additional Barbie doll. We're not in it to make toys. We know how to do that; we've been doing that for almost 80 years. Make a great movie, and good things will follow.' And we did sell a lot of Barbies coming out of that, and good things did happen. But I think what the movie was was a showcase that we mean what we say when we're going to choose the best creatives and trust in them. Not every movie we create will be a Barbie, surely, but it's the same approach as we go forward. And it's not just film. The strategy with Mattel's transformation is to go from just being a toy manufacturer making items to an IP company managing franchises. That's film, that's episodic television content, that's digital gaming, that's live experiences. So for us, we're just getting started, and the proof is in the Barbie movie. People want to experience our brands and engage with them outside the physical toy.

I don't think I ever asked why you chose Barbie to focus your work on. It was the phenomenon of the year, but if there was anything that you felt like you had a little glimmer of history that you thought could make an interesting case study, or what was that initial kernel and the idea to focus here?

You know, hearing that — it hurts a little bit to hear you weren't allowed to play with Barbies. But we learned that in our research. Going back 10 years, we did some research, and it was playing back to us that mothers were not proud or comfortable buying Barbie as a birthday party gift. I mean, Ruth Handler created a doll to inspire the limitless potential in every girl. Barbie went to the moon, had careers. So Ruth Handler was on to something. To think that the perception of the brand was such that you weren't allowed to play with them was the reason we went on the journey we did 10 years ago to evolve the doll and also to make parents and children really embrace what Barbie stands for and to make Barbie look like the world around her. That was also part of the journey with Warner Brothers. They came up with a brilliant marketing tagline: 'If you love Barbie, this movie's for you. If you hate Barbie, this movie's for you.' Of course, the old Mattel would have been like, 'Nobody hates Barbie; you can't say you hate Barbie.' But we know it's true. We know that there were perceptions and old perceptions, and we wanted to address those head-on. So for you, having seen the movie and having that new view, that was everything. That was why we did it and what we wanted to make in this film.

I think that's what sort of shined our halo in the whole thing. We knew that Greta was coming from a place of love. She loved Barbie. She talked about playing with Barbie far longer than all of her friends had in her youth, and she was a great student of the history. Certainly easier for us to take it on the chin because we've evolved. But Margot and Greta had both said they wouldn't have made this movie had we not evolved the brand. So you're right. For other brands, if you're going to poke fun at yourself, you've got to be able to take it, and it does have to be authentic. And it worked.

Nice try, Tina. But I will say the whole goal with Mattel films — we want to create franchises, and we're really just starting to launch our cinematic universe, such as it is. With 15 other announced films in development and many more that we haven't announced, and the proof of Barbie, we're pretty excited about the future.

Just the sheer number of partners. I think we learned so much. We had the benefit of working with Warner Brothers, and I had worked at Discovery, which is now Warner Brothers Discovery, so at least when we embarked on the film, I had some familiarity with some of the players and partners in this new capacity. But identifying swim lanes, constant communication — I think I had probably on average six Barbie movie-themed meetings a day for at least an eight-month period. It was so big and so bold, and it was a film that obviously meant a lot to us. It could have easily failed if we didn't have the right partners and things didn't go right, and could have damaged the Barbie brand after all that work we'd done. So for me, trying to anticipate issues was hard on this one because there were so many different messages, so many points of interest, such big stars. This was the first — Greta is a brilliant director and writer, but this was her first big commercial film. There was a lot of focus on that, on Margot, on Ryan, on the cast. We also were very supportive of trying to keep it under wraps because how do you describe this movie? Look back now, and how do you describe what it's going to be? Greta wanted to keep the diverse cast behind Margot and Ryan a secret until a little bit later when they were ready to show the trailer. So keeping a lid on that, knowing what we had — the magic that we had in the casting and the messages and all the positives about the film — but holding back so that people didn't get pink fatigue. Warner Brothers was a master at that as well. So just swim lanes and so many different partners.

You know, it was conscious and unconscious, I think, because you're right, it is the role of the CCO to sort of bring all of that together and anticipate issues. We had decided that Greta Gerwig was going to have creative freedom, but that didn't mean that we didn't have control or a say in the film. For me, it was an interesting point because we all got this script, and I was not in a position really to — we didn't want to — we gave suggestions on Greta's script. She very kindly would talk about how Mattel was so collaborative, and even when we provided input, it would be in the form of a question. One of the questions in the script that got out in the press was, 'Does the Mattel executive need to get shot?' question mark. So those sorts of things we anticipated and tried to prepare for. For me, it really was just knowing that this was our moment. I don't think our partners really knew going into it how interested the world would be in the Mattel story — not just the history of Ruth Handler and the history, but the history of Barbie and her evolution and Mattel's challenges along the way. It was also a moment to emphasize the fact that we are a company with purpose, and all of our brands are rooted in purpose. Also, I was very proud to be part of the group that pulled together a philanthropy initiative. We worked with Save the Children. It was a win-win-win because Warner Brothers, Mattel, and SPA — we all are strong partners of Save the Children. So we got behind a tech-to-donate campaign for their girls' empowerment initiatives globally. That was a particular point of pride. But it was pulling all of those things together and knowing you're going to give creative freedom to your filmmaker — what do you have to prepare for in that moment? Lots of conversations about patriarchy and feminism and Mattel's comfortability with embracing the fun and being poked fun at. I'd like to say I anticipated them all; I didn't. But it was a lot of pulling together of different constituents for sure.

Yeah, that was pretty powerful. We were seeing the film all along the way to see it take shape. Certainly on the page it was brilliant, but the way America brought it to life — I forget how many takes Greta did of that because she's a perfectionist — but it really became an anthem and a movement over the summer. We did leap to our feet. Our headquarters is based in El Segundo, California, and we closed the offices. For the local employees, we did a premiere a week out, and all of our employees showed up in pink and all sorts of ball gowns and such. Just the joy on employees' faces — some who've been here 25, 30 years — that we've finally taken this brand and put it on the big screen was just an incredible moment of pride. We did that around the world in our regional offices. So we all leapt with joy.