Barbie is continuing to dominate the box office. In just nine days, it crossed the $300 million mark, making it the fastest female-driven movie to do so domestically. Woo-hoo! I finally saw Barbie this weekend (without my kids) and loved it! It was a hot pink ball of fun and feelings. It was particularly awesome to see how many women were dressed in pink to celebrate the movie. There were even several men, including Mr. Rosie, who wore pink, too. I love when movies like this become a cultural event, you know? To have a nice thing to rally around in society during otherwise frustrating times.
*Mild spoilers ahead.* I’m around the same age as Greta Gerwig and played with Barbie dolls non-stop as a kid. I love how many Barbies (and Kens, Skipper, etc. al) were represented, and that even the end credits had more obscure ones. I loved America Ferrara’s speech, the musical montages, the Ken-off, the soundtrack, the existential questions it posed, and of course, the powerful overall message it had. Turns out, among all of those zany hijinks that went on in Barbieland, we could have had a fart opera!
If you watched “Barbie” and thought it was missing a proper fart joke, then you might’ve loved one scene that Greta Gerwig and editor Nick Houy left on the cutting room floor.
In a new IndieWire interview with the collaborators, it was revealed that “Barbie” had a “fart opera” in the middle of its runtime that got cut because it wasn’t received as well as Gerwig hoped.
“We’ve always tried to get in a proper fart joke and we’ve never done it,” Gerwig said. “We had like a fart opera in the middle [of ‘Barbie’]. I thought it was really funny. And that was not the consensus.”
“It was in the wrong place, too,” Houy added. “We need to work it into a more significant narrative moment next time.”
Houy has been the editor on all of Gerwig’s solo directorial outings, but “Barbie” presented unique challenges.
“[‘Barbie’] was so much more a comedy than ‘Lady Bird’ and ‘Little Women,’” Houy said about opening up more to the test screening process. “So we were just, like, ‘Let’s put it in front of people and see how they react.’ Everyone’s different and every screening’s different and we’ve definitely learned, over the years, that you really have to let things have their fair chance and then act accordingly. Once you know it’s dead, you have got to get it out of there.”
Whatever choices Gerwig and Houy made in the editing room as a result of test screenings appears to have paid off. “Barbie” has earned critical acclaim and is a box office powerhouse, soaring past the $200 million mark at the domestic box office in just five days. Its $162 million opening weekend is the highest ever for a female director.
I would LOVE to know where that fart opera was supposed to happen, and its context. I wonder if was supposed to happen when the Kens were forming their Kendom? Was it a part of the Ken dance-off? Kate McKinnon seems like she’d be down for a fart opera, so maybe it was part of Weird Barbie’s story? Anyone have any ideas or theories? #ReleaseTheGerwigFartCut!
Oh, and just an aside for anyone else who is into this sort of thing like I am, when I Googled how old Greta Gerwig was, I realized that she has the same birthday as the Duchess of Sussex and President Obama, August 4. I just thought that was a neat bit of trivia.
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- LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JULY 09: Director/Writer/EP Greta Gerwig attends the World Premiere of “Barbie” at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall on July 09, 2023 in Los Angeles, California.,Image: 788399692, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Greta Gerwig, Credit line: Jeffrey Mayer / Avalon
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- Greta Gerwig photographed attending the European premiere of Barbie at Cineworld Leicester Square in London, UK on 12 July 2023.,Image: 788742381, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Julie Edwards / Avalon
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- Sydney, AUSTRALIA – Australian pink carpet premiere of the Barbie movie in Sydney. Pictured: Greta Gerwig, Issa Rae, Margot Robbie, America Ferrera BACKGRID USA 30 JUNE 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Marc Skinner / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Photos credit: Avalon.red, Backgrid and via Instagram
Still haven’t watched Barbie but now I’m even more excited to see it armed with the knowledge there is NOT a fart opera scene. Big thank you to the test audiences and the editing team! (I hate fart jokes but that’s just me)
I completely agree! I hate fart humor! Remember that totally cringe scene in the first SATC movie about diarrhea? Unwatchable and not remotely funny. Yes, thank you test audience for sparing us from that experience!
Same.
Bathroom “humor,” including bodily fluid and dirty underwear “jokes” is the absolute worst. I hate Margaret Cho for descending into that. I guess I am, thankfully, beyond the demographic that sees any of that as funny rather than immature and revolting. For boys in elementary and middle school it was the funniest thing ever and I guess Tyler Perry thinks so too. Not me. And not in Bridesmaids either.
@DaisyMae, me too! It was the worst part if Bridesmaids. Just not funny.
SAME. I hate how every comedy has to have a mandatory farting/diarrhea/puke scene. It’s just so cringe! I always just zone out, like ”oh well here it comes, let’s get this over with”. Do people really find them funny?
Couldn’t agree more with all of the comments above. I don’t find them funny let alone necessary. And when I’m watching a movie I don’t want to think about other people’s digestive tracks.
If there is a compelling reason – for example a drama highlighting the reality of living in a third world country without sewage systems than we are used to, or a movie about people in the wilderness needing to find a safe place to go to the bathroom – ok, sure. But I don’t find it comedic at all. It’s a lazy way to try to get laughs.
A fart opera would have cheapened the film but the right wing misogynists like Ben Shapiro probably would have enjoyed iti
they’d like it only if it was Ken farting in a very bro scene. They’d probably flip out at how “unlady-like” farting is if it was a Barbie or two letting them rip
Then I’m even more glad they cut it. The less Ben Shapiro enjoys things, the happier I am!
A fart opera just sounds stupid, so I’m glad it was cut.
We saw it yesterday (took my 8 and 11 year old boys to see it, lol.) I thought it was super enjoyable. they definitely hit you over the head with the themes, there’s no escaping the point the movie was trying to make, so it lost points for me because of its lack of subtlety.
But overall it was enjoyable, I did get teary eyed at points, and I definitely texted my childhood BFF last night who lives a few states away and demanded she come back so we can see Barbie together, lol. I also died at the BBC Pride and Prejudice reference. We saw it at 11 am on a Sunday and our theater was sold out, pretty good mix of men and women and different ages.
Movies directed by women, featuring women, aimed at women audiences can earn hundreds of millions and I really hope the studios begin to pick up on that at some point.
If they still don’t get it after “Barbie”, they never will.
I remember when Sister Act came out and was a big hit the commentary was the same. Just checked and that was 30 years ago.
There is a documentary that came out in 2018 called “This Changes Everything” about events that should have created a space at the table for women. It’s very good. Depressing, but accurate.
Yes, for all the talk of it “not being for kids”, I definitely left thinking it was more a movie for young people considering how simplistic the themes were. But I had low expectations going in so taking it as a giant, fun, superhero flick was still v enjoyable.
Saw it yesterday too and I agree with your assessment. The set design and some of the numbers are indeed fun and amazing. I lol’ed at the right parts and clapped along with everyone else after “The Speech.” Does it deserve a spot next to “Mean Girls” and “Legally Blonde”? For me, not quite, as a lot of the messaging was forced and the character arcs, while inspired, never realized their full potential. It was frothy/wordy fun and a visual delight. I don’t regret seeing it in theaters at all…maybe it’ll grow on me even more upon second viewing?
Thank you, test audiences and editor. That did not sound entertaining to me, and the movie is better for not having it in it.
I think worldwide it is a close to $800 million! It’s venturing into superhero comic book movie avengers territory.
Took my (adult) daughter to see it over the weekend and we both LOVED it! I had her take a picture of me in front of the movie poster, in my pink top!
We have fart humor in my house (thanks kids) and it doesn’t bother me, but I hate it in movies. It just seems so obviously fake and I’ve never seen a fart joke that’s made me laugh.
I haven’t seen the movie yet but I plan to.
I am very glad they left out the fart opera. I honestly hate scatological humor. It’s one thing for little kids to giggle over farting and poop, but for adults? I don’t get it.
The one time I thought it worked was in in “Tropic Thunder,” when at the start of the movie they showed previews for the fake movies the fake stars were doing to give us a sense of what they were all about. So Ben Stiller got overhyped action hero, Robert Downey Junior got intense method actor, etc. And Jack Black got fart humor! But that was satirical, so it was different.
Finally got around to see “Barbie” this weekend and it was great. It’s a deceptively simple movie that eviscerates the patriarchy, while wearing a bright smile, which explains why conservative commentators are crying over this movie. The fart opera would have felt out of place.
I’d bet my house that the fart opera was meant to be Kendom’s cultural offering. (Like the “Butt” movie in Idiocracy.) And I’m glad it was cut! Cringe. I saw the movie yesterday with my (enlightened) husband who hated it because, in his words, “the themes are important but they were so dumbed down, is this what our society has become?” To be fair, he has no sisters and went to all-boys schools so he didn’t grow up knowing anyone who played with Barbies, and so the satire which I thought was hilarious was lost on him. I had to explain: “No sweetie, you don’t get it, everyone had 17 Barbies and only 1 Ken, and Ken stayed in the box unless he was needed as a platonic date to a Barbie prom…” And then he suddenly had some sympathy for the Kens. 🤣🤣🤣
Count me in as another who hates bathroom humour, I know some people love it but it makes me cringe. I loved the Barbie movie and I’m thinking of going a second time, and I’m just so grateful that was cut.
Nope to the gas.