Diablo Cody Says She’d Trade Her Oscar for Barbie’s Success

Diablo Cody, who once worked on a Barbie movie, said in a new interview that she thinks the massive success of Greta Gerwig’s film will ultimately be better for Gerwig and Margot Robbie than any awards they might have won. Cody, who earned the 2008 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Juno, told People magazine that she would trade the award for a billion-dollar movie. Cody’s new movie, Lisa Frankenstein, is the latest in a series of quirky movies that have been her stock-in-trade since winning her Oscar, but the commercial success her films have seen has been somewhat limited.

Ironically, one of the big things that stood in the way of Cody’s commercial success may have been The Lego Movie, which she described as an obstacle to getting her version of Barbie made. A few years and a studio change later, Warner Bros. — who also made The Lego Movie — actually saw that as a benefit instead.

“Here’s what I’m going to say. Obviously, of course I think Greta deserved a nomination and so did Margot,” Cody told People. “But they made a billion dollars on that movie, okay? I would trade my Oscar for a billion-dollar movie right now, if I could flip a switch! Sorry if that’s disrespectful to the Academy.”

Barbie earned eight Academy Awards nominations, with America Ferrera and Ryan Gosling both getting acting nominations. Robbie and Gerwig, though, weren’t nominated, and that has turned into a big topic of conversation over the last week.  

Back in July, as Barbie was making tremendous waves, stories about the various false starts of the project started bubbling to the top — especially those who involved Cody and Amy Schumer, both of whom are outspoken feminists and felt like the exact kind of people who would have worked on a movie not unlike Gerwig’s.

“I’m telling you, that was a tough project,” Cody told People. “Having worked on [a Barbie project] made me respect it all the more, because that is a very challenging property to take and turn into something real. And they did it.”

In Barbie, 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. From Oscar-nominated writer/director Greta Gerwig comes Barbie. Barbie stars Oscar-nominees Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as Barbie and Ken, alongside America Ferrera, Kate McKinnon, Michael Cera, Ariana Greenblatt, Issa Rae, Rhea Perlman, and Will Ferrell. The film also stars Ana Cruz Kayne, Emma Mackey, Hari Nef, Alexandra Shipp, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Simu Liu, Ncuti Gatwa, Scott Evans, Jamie Demetriou, Connor Swindells, Sharon Rooney, Nicola Coughlan, Ritu Arya, Grammy Award-winning singer/songwriter Dua Lipa and Oscar-winner Helen Mirren. Gerwig directed Barbie from a screenplay by Gerwig & Oscar nominee Noah Baumbach, based on Barbie by Mattel.