Back in early 2023, movie audiences were still unaware that pop culture’s near future would be taken over entirely by one of the most amusing and clever entertainment portmanteaus ever: Barbenheimer. It sparked an entire movement, and legitimately inspired people to rush out and watch Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer back to back, helping the former bring in over $1.4 billion at the box office, while the latter brought in around $950 million. It’s still quite the feat, even years later.
Robbie appeared on The Graham Norton Show to talk up her newest big-screen release, the sultry adaptation Wuthering Heights, which has done some box-office crushing of its own in its first weekend. Of course, she also reflected on the aforementioned success of Warner Bros.’ two blockbusters, and addressed a question that fans will still ask her about it, which sounds quite maddening to deal with. As she put it:
'How did you plan the Barbenheimer of it all?'
By all means, I realize not everyone out there grasps the ins and outs of how Hollywood works, and that there are lots of misunderstandings at play. (I have personally been blamed by readers in the past, via email, for TV shows being canceled, despite such decisions being above and completely unrelated to my paygrade.) But it’s still more than a little wild to me that there are those who believe the filmmakers somehow schemed this up alongside studio execs, since this would be the goal for literally all movies if there was any corporate inkling it would result in profits.
For the most part, studio heads are careful NOT to release two different high-profile features on the same day, since that comes with the risk of having audiences only spending money on one film or the other. Also, even if both of the movies were produced by Warner Bros., it's not like it's perfectly natural for any two competing movies to purposefully latch together for promotional purposes, so even from a creative standpoint, the idea to smoosh the two together isn't so organic. To Robbie's point:
I was like, ‘We didn’t.’ You can’t plan for something like that. And it worked beautifully for both movies, and it was really wonderful.
In fact, Robbie followed that up by referencing a previously discussed anecdote about one of Oppenheimer’s producers gauging whether or not the Barbie team would be willing to adjust the toy-centered comedy’ release date. As she put it:
I actually know the producer Chuck Roven, who was a producer on Oppenheimer, and he called us and he was like, ‘I hear you’ve got that date.’ He’s like, ‘That’s when we are.’ And I was like ‘Oh, wow, cool.’ And he went, ‘You should move dates.’ I was so thrilled, because I was like, ‘He’s asking me to move dates. He’s scared. We’re a threat.’ And I was like — [mimes holding telephone] — ‘We’re not moving dates. If you’re so worried, you should move dates. In fact, I think it’s gonna be a great thing if we’re on the same date. It’ll be a great double billing.’
To be sure, Robbie clarified that this was more of a friendly conversation, and that Chuck Roven wasn't attempting to force the issue. But she also made it clear that the request was still serious enough to be a legit indication of how bullish (or not) Oppenheimer's team felt about competing with Barbie. (The shocked look on Amanda Seyfried's face as this story was told is priceless.) Had Robbie and Gerwig been willing to adjust things, there's little doubt that all involved would have supported the move.
That didn't happen though, obviously, and the dual release spawned both 2023's highest-earning movie of 2023 (Barbie), and third-biggest movie (Oppenheimer). While I can understand the need to learn that human brains intentionally set up such success, sometimes all it takes is some dumb luck and a social media frenzy.
If anyone needed proof of the longevity of Barbenheimer's success, look no further than Oppenheimer co-star Robert Downey Jr. suggesting "Dunesday," a combo-name for Dune 3 and Avengers: Doomsday, being used ahead of those upcoming 2026 releases dropping in December. Time will tell whether anybody uses that one or not.
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