Barbie: Ryan Gosling Pushed For A Wild Ken Fight That Never Made The Final Cut
"Barbie" is a beautifully over-the-top movie, and Ryan Gosling's performance as Ken makes the whole experience even more extra. Apparently, there was an even wilder scene that never made it past the rehearsal process, and according to writer-director Greta Gerwig, it involved Ken's luscious mink coat.
During an appearance on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," Gerwig revealed that at some point during Ken's transformation from humble sidekick to would-be edge lord, he was supposed to have a dance scene with the giant mink coat he starts wearing after he's taken over Barbie Land and installed his cruddy version of patriarchy. "One of the ideas that Ryan had was that he would have a dance duet with his mink and that the mink would be fighting him, and then love him, and then fight him again, eventually defeat him, and that he would be birthed anew out of the mink," Gerwig told Colbert.
Even more tantalizing is the fact that Gerwig said the rehearsal was filmed, but that said footage is in "the vault." Maybe one day she'll see fit to release it, but until then, we can only imagine a scene where Ken and his sentient mink coat go back and forth between love and hate before truly becoming one.
Why does Ken even wear a mink coat in Barbie?
As Greta Gerwig told Stephen Colbert during that same interview, being on-set on "Barbie" was quite playful, and the reason anyone came up with a mink dance duet is because the process was so collaborative. "Even though it didn't end up being in the movie, it was that kind of openness and everybody bringing such brilliant, wild ideas that allowed it to happen in its form," she said. "So we had a fun week exploring what it would be if he did his mink ballet."
So why does Ken don a mink coat after he travels to the real world and realizes that patriarchy elevates men there, as opposed to Barbie Land, which is a matriarchal structure until he starts meddling? According to Gerwig, she and Ryan Gosling worked closely together and sent each other photos as inspiration for the character, and some of those photos were of "Rocky" star Sylvester Stallone. For his part, Stallone loves a good mink, and there are even a few cheeky photos included in a montage within "Barbie" as Ken discovers the patriarchy. So it's very clear that Gerwig and Gosling wanted to pay tribute to a man known to rock a giant mink coat.
Ken's transformation in Barbie is central to the film — and maybe even overshadows Barbie's arc
Ostensibly, Barbie (Margot Robbie) is the main character of the film named after her. But while Ryan Gosling's Ken doesn't fight any mink coats during the film's theatrical release, the actor kind of runs away with the entire movie, thanks to his character's wildly complex emotional journey.
At first, Ken is "just Ken" — compared to Barbie, who is "everything" — and even though he frequently tries to spend more time with the woman who's supposed to love him, he always ends up disappointed when she ditches him for a girls' night with other Barbies. This is certainly not to say that Ken's plot to start a patriarchy in Barbie Land, which leaves Barbie homeless in the process, is a good thing. It's unequivocally not. What is good, though, is the inner peace he finds when Barbie points out to him that he needs to figure out who he is without her there to define him. Finally, Ken is free of simply being Barbie's sidekick; he is, in fact, "Kenough." Barbie's the character who becomes a human woman by the end of the film, but without Ken's mink coat phase while he rules over his Kendom, the movie just wouldn't feel complete.