Not Kenough: ‘Barbie’ casting directors share a long list of actors who turned down Ken and Allan roles
In the “Barbie” movie, Ryan Gosling’s “Beach” Ken and Margot Robbie’s “Stereotypical” Barbie could have been accompanied by a very different assortment of additional Kens.
And while a bevy of actors rose to the occasion, there were others who really wanted to take up residence in the idyllic play land brought to life in Greta Gerwig’s box-office smash.
Ferrera, who co-stars in ‘Barbie’ as Gloria, a lifelong admirer of the doll, delivers a rousing speech about womanhood in the film. Here’s how it came together.
Who? Well, the film’s casting directors, Allison Jones and London-based Lucy Bevan, recently shared a list of actors who wanted to play Ken’s diverse counterparts in the feminist feature.
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Among the performers in the running were “Saturday Night Live” comedian Bowen Yang, “Schitt’s Creek” writer-star Dan Levy and “Pitch Perfect” singer Ben Platt. But those actors were edged out due to COVID-19 restrictions, Jones said. Alas, they never got to move into Barbie Land’s countless Dream homes or turn them into Ken’s brewski-peddling mojo dojo casa houses.
“They were, I’m not kidding, really bummed they couldn’t do it,” Jones told Vanity Fair.
Jones, who cast Gerwig’s Oscar-nominated “Lady Bird,” said she and Bevan started casting the film in the early days of the COVID-19 lockdowns. During filming, performers had to spend three months in London to shoot the movie, and the aforementioned trio of actors couldn’t make the logistics work.
Yang notably went on to star in the rom-coms “Fire Island” and “Bros,” Levy took on HBO’s “The Idol” and the upcoming “Haunted Mansion,” and Platt had roles in “Dear Evan Hansen,” “The People We Hate at the Wedding” and “Theater Camp.”
Even Selena Gomez, Camila Cabello, Quentin Tarantino and Tom Cruise took part in the ‘Barbenheimer’ weekend — here’s how celebs celebrated the blockbusters (and which films they saw).
The additional big Kenergy roles ultimately went to Simu Liu, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Scott Evans, Ncuti Gatwa and even John Cena, who makes brief appearances as Mermaid Ken thanks to a chance encounter with Robbie. As for the other Barbies who run the candy-colored Barbie Land, Jones and Bevin cast Issa Rae, Kate McKinnon, Alexandra Shipp, Nicola Coughlan, Hari Nef and Dua Lipa as unforgettable embodiments of Mattel’s iconic powerhouse.
Actors reportedly treated the auditions as “a run-do-not-walk situation,” Vanity Fair said, because they were eager to work with Gerwig, a fellow actor whose directing credits also include “Nights and Weekends” and “Little Women.”
Hopeful actors sent in videos or did readings over Zoom, and Gerwig talked to some before sharing the script because she “really wanted to get to know them as people,” Bevan said.
“That was very important to her,” she added. “On the key Barbie and Ken roles, she got a very good idea of what an actor was like from talking to them.”
Marvel’s “Shang-Chi” star Liu was among those “dying to be a Ken,” Jones said.
Before taking part in the SAG-AFTRA actors’ strike last week, the last thing Liu wrote in Threads about the film was that “it was the experience of a lifetime to make, and will be an experience of a lifetime to watch onscreen with a crowd.”
“Frozen” and “Hamilton” star Jonathan Groff was also eyed for the role of Ken’s oddball sidekick, Allan, but the part eventually went to Michael Cera, who plays the peripheral character with the kind of awkward gusto only he can.
“Dear, dear Jonathan Groff was like, ‘I can’t believe I’m typing this, but I can’t do Allan,’” Jones said.
Groff went on to star in four episodes of “Lost Ollie,” one episode of HBO’s “And Just Like That ...” and in the horror flick “Knock at the Cabin.”
In past iterations of the long-delayed film, the titular doll was set to be played by Amy Schumer (and at one point rumors swirled around Anne Hathaway) before Robbie, who also produced the film, nabbed the role.
And Gerwig and Gosling, who got a lot of guff about his age when he was cast, managed to turn his Ken into the unexpected emotional center of the movie after his character is hilariously wooed by patriarchal tropes. (Spoiler alert: He’s just Ken, and that’s Kenough.)
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