Actor Alexandra Shipp is ready for the Barbie backlash, especially if it comes from men who don’t understand how subversive entertainment works.
Shipp is known for her performances as Susan in Tick, Tick… Boom! and as young Storm in X-Men: Apocalypse and X-Men: Dark Phoenix. But next month, everyone will know her as Writer Barbie in Greta Gerwig’s event film that’s poised to knock even Christopher Nolan from his customary perch at the top of the box office.
Of course, such anticipation is bound to result in a backlash from people saying the film isn’t worth the hype or, worse, saying that it’s toxic for how it presents the technically sex-less “male” and “female” lead characters.
Shipp recently sat down with Interview magazine, where she was explicitly asked if she’s prepared for men to be offended by the film. The actor replied, “If we offend men, I’m going to be so excited. … Let’s make them all uncomfortable. That would be really great.”
Shipp explained further:
“Because maybe a lot of the things that the Kens do that might make [men] upset are things that they actually do, too. We love a mirrored image, babe. I think the world takes art and metaphors a little too seriously at times.”
When the interviewer pointed out that Barbie is technically a satire, Shipp added:
“It’s slapstick as fuck. It’s Barbie Land, it’s camp. True art is agitation propaganda. It’s about making your audience think and question what they’re actually doing and why they’re doing it.”
Besides that we’re now definitely getting a tattoo that says, “True art is agitation propaganda,” there’s a lot of merit in what Shipp is saying. After all, isn’t the reason we have satires so that artists can come down hard on what they find repellant about society without outright lecturing? If there’s no room for Barbie, there’s certainly no room for Fight Club.
Also, guys who may be offended by the presentation of men in Barbie might want to remember the decades upon decades that women have had to sit through movies with poorly resolved female characters written by men with no empathy for ladies at all. Hopefully the fellas can sit through a single two-hour film inspired by a line of toys without writing their congressman.