Many moons ago, in 2017, Amy Schumer was attached to the upcoming Barbie live-action movie, which she was slated to star in and write. She left the project due to “scheduling conflicts” that, at the time, were attributed to her 2018 romantic comedy I Feel Pretty. In a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the comedian opened up about what actually drove her to part ways with the studio.
Schumer explains that she didn’t like the direction that then-studio, Sony, was going in (the project later moved to Warner Bros). “They definitely didn’t want to do it the way I wanted to do it, the only way I was interested in doing it,” the Oscars host admitted. Schumer and her writing partner Kim Caramele wrote Barbie as an “ambitious inventor,” but the studio insisted that she “invent” a high heel made out of Jell-O, which seems a bit silly, even for a movie based on a plastic doll.
To top it all off, the company then sent her a pair of really expensive shoes to celebrate, which made Schumer feel iffy. “The idea that that’s just what every woman must want, right there, I should have gone, ‘You’ve got the wrong gal,’” she added. Schumer left the project shortly after, and Margot Robbie was cast.
Schumer left her UTA team after that. “I felt like I was disappointing my team by not being Barbie,” the actress admitted. Instead, she will play a very important role in the upcoming Oscars by being one of three hosts. That’s pretty monumental in its own right. She also stars in the upcoming Hulu series Life & Beth alongside Michael Cera, while the Barbie movie is still in production, after nearly five years. It seems like leaving the project behind didn’t hurt her career one bit!