Oliver Stone Clears Up Resurfaced ‘Barbie’ Comments, And Deadline Owes Him A Mea Culpa For Serving Up An Old Inflammatory Quote

The Deadline Team
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The Savages director said he made the remarks “before the film even came out” and while he was promoting his documentary Nuclear Now.

Oliver Stone was clearing up his Barbie comments from last year after an interview with the filmmaker resurfaced recently. Deadline took a deserved shot from him also. Click below to see the whole statement by the multi-Oscar winner:

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“At the time, I was busy promoting my nuclear documentary in Europe and had little to no knowledge of the project beyond its title,” he said in a post he shared on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. His comments resurfaced virally but he made it clear that he said them before he watched Barbie in theaters last July. That is too long a time span to be served back up as fresh aggregation.

Since publicly commenting on Greta Gerwig’s film, Oliver said he “was able to see Barbie in a theater back in July and appreciated the film for its originality and its themes.”

He continued, “I found the filmmakers’ approach certainly different than what I expected. I apologize for speaking ignorantly.”

Stone went on to praise Gerwig’s 2017 film Ladybird, saying it “was one of my favorites of that year.” The filmmaker also recognized Barbie’s impact on the industry.

“Barbie’s box office greatly boosted the morale of our business, which was welcome. I wish Greta and the entire Barbie team good fortune at the Oscars,” he said.

Oliver’s comments about Barbie stem from an interview he did with City A.M. back in June 2023, weeks before the Margot Robbie-starring film was released in theaters.

The director seemingly criticized the film and suggested Ryan Gosling attach himself to different types of projects.

“Ryan Gosling is wasting his time if he’s doing that shit for money. He should be doing more serious films. He shouldn’t be a part of this infantilization of Hollywood. Now it’s all fantasy, fantasy, fantasy, including all the war pictures: fantasy, fantasy,” Oliver said at the time.

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