Reese Witherspoon is bringing Barbies origin story to the big screen

LACMA 2015 Art+Film Gala honouring James Turrell And Alejandro G Inarritu, presented by Gucci
Reese Witherspoon, through her production company Pacific Standard, has optioned the 2010 book Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World’s Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her. The 39-year-old actress seems to be eyeing the title role herself. This isn’t the first time: back in 2012, she acquired the rights to Cheryl Strayed’s memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail and played her on the big screen (in the more marquee-friendly titled Wild), receiving critical kudos and an Oscar nomination for her performance.

Barbie and Ruth tells the tale of Ruth Handler (no relation to Chelsea), who created the now iconic doll after watching her daughter, Barbara, playing with paper dolls featuring teenagers, as opposed to the baby dolls that were popular at the time. Handler modeled Barbie on a German adult novelty toy (really – where do you think she got those boobs?) with her husband, who owned the toy company Mattel. The doll debuted in 1959 and has become one of the most popular toys of all time. In fact, one Barbie doll is sold every 3 seconds somewhere in the world. Despite having over 150 careers, the doll has courted controversy over the years for creating unrealistic expectations for girls and even grown women. Ruth handled her critics with aplomb, writing in her 1994 autobiography, Dream Doll: The Ruth Handler Story, “My whole philosophy of Barbie was that through the doll, the little girl could be anything she wanted to be. Barbie always represented the fact that a woman has choices.”

In 1970, Ruth was diagnosed with breast cancer, and, since she was unable to find a suitable prosthetic breast, she developed her own – using plastic for good for once – and ended up founding a company to produce more realistic prosthesis for breast cancer survivors. She died in 2002 at age 85 from complications after surgery for colon cancer. The woman led a very compelling life and her story is sure to make for an interesting film.

Reese and Ruth do have some things in common, which leads me to believe she’s correct in casting herself as the lead. Pacific Standard, which Reese started with partner Bruna Papandrea, focuses on acquiring movie rights to stories featuring more female protagonists. At Glamour’s Women of the Year event last month, Reese spoke out about the sad lack of female-focused movies, saying, “Films with women at the center are not a public service project. They are a big-time, bottom line-enhancing, money-making commodity.”

Reese’s production company was also responsible for producing Gone Girl (excellent) and Hot Pursuit (meh). She’s aggressively working to bring more female faces to the big screen and even helping young women improve their economic literacy skills, so this project is completely in line with her girl power vibe. I guess this means that she’s no longer in contention for the real-life Barbie movie that Diablo Cody is writing? But, at 39, it’s probably a given that she would be out of contention to play a living teen-aged doll anyway. Damn you and your ageism, Hollywood!

Glamour's 25th Anniversary Women of the Year Awards in New York

LACMA 2015 Art+Film Gala honouring James Turrell And Alejandro G Inarritu, presented by Gucci

photo credit: WENN.com and Getty Images

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7pLHLnpmirJOdxm%2BvzqZmbW1paIF1e9GenKydj6y2tbTEq6qpp5%2BjrKq%2FvpupoqaXnruoq8GaqZuhlaissL7IoKCnl6OpvLPFvq2mmKyYmqyjtcaYqpyqlZq7cA%3D%3D