Barbie first arrived in stores in 1959, and quickly became a worldwide phenomenon. Over the past 60 years, Mattel's most famous doll (née Barbara Millicent Roberts) has held hundreds of jobs, weathered countless controversies, and continually reinvented herself to adapt and change to the times. And though Barbie's had several direct-to-video animated features, and plenty of parodies, she has never had a big screen, live-action outing of her own — until now.

After toiling away in development limbo, bouncing between studios, creatives and stars (Amy Schumer was set to star as Barbie at one point), it was finally announced that two-time Oscar nominee Margot Robbie would play the title role, with two-time Oscar nominee Ryan Gosling as her Ken and three-time Oscar nominee Greta Gerwig at the helm. Below, find everything else we know so far about Barbie.  

What is 'Barbie' about?

Plot specifics have been kept under wraps, beyond this teaser-y logline: "To live in Barbie Land is to be a perfect being in a perfect place. Unless you have a full-on existential crisis. Or you're a Ken." Robbie's Barbie will be the doll in crisis, and Gosling's Ken will crash her escape to the Real World.

When does it come out?

Barbie opens in theaters on July 21 and internationally beginning July 19.

Is there a trailer?

Yes, and you can watch it now:

Who else is in the movie?

Kate McKinnon, Issa Rae, Ana Cruz Kayne, Emma Mackey, Hari Nef, Alexandra Shipp, Sharon Rooney, Nicola Coughlan, Ritu Arya, and Dua Lipa all play Barbies, while Kingsley Ben-Adir, Simu Liu, Ncuti Gatwa, and Scott Evans play Kens. Michael Cera plays Ken's BFF Allan, with Oscar winner Emerald Fennell cast as Barbie's best friend Midge. John Cena, naturally, plays a merman.

In the Real World, Will Ferrell plays the CEO of Mattel, with Jamie Demetriou and Connor Swindells as employees of the toy company, and America Ferrera and Ariana Greenblatt play human characters that Barbie and Ken encounter on their adventure.

Oscar winner Helen Mirren, meanwhile, will serve as the movie's narrator.

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Who's behind the scenes?

Barbie is a co-production between Warner Bros. and Robbie's LuckyChap Entertainment, the production company behind Oscar-winning films like I, Tonya and Promising Young Woman. In 2021, Robbie told British Vogue, "People generally hear Barbie and think, 'I know what that movie is going to be,' and then they hear that Greta Gerwig is writing and directing it, and they're like, 'Oh, well, maybe I don't...'"

Barbie serves as Gerwig's follow-up to 2019's Oscar-nominated Little Women and 2017's Oscar-nominated Lady Bird before that, directing from a screenplay she co-wrote with Noah Baumbach (a fellow three-time Oscar nominee for The Squid and the Whale and Marriage Story).

The creative team behind the camera includes three-time Oscar-nominated director of photography Rodrigo Prieto, six-time Oscar-nominated production designer Sarah Greenwood, two-time Oscar-winning costume designer Jacqueline Durran (Little Women and Anna Karenina), and two-time Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat (The Shape of Water and The Grand Budapest Hotel).

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