Ryan Gosling Doubted His 'Kenergy,' But The Barbie Team Conjured It Out Of Him [CinemaCon 2023]

Has there ever been a more perfect modern film casting choice than Ryan Gosling as Ken in the upcoming "Barbie"? I certainly can't think of one that's more perfect, especially when Gosling talks about the role as if taking it was his sacred destiny. We already know that Ken has no money, no car, no job, and no house in director Greta Gerwig's meta-comedy, but what does he have? Pure, unadulterated Kenergy, which apparently Gosling was nervous about embracing during filming.

/Film's Ben Pearson attended Warner Bros. Pictures' CinemaCon panel this year, where he saw new footage of "Barbie" ahead of its theatrical release in the summer. During the panel, Gosling was joined by Gerwig and his co-stars Margot Robbie and America Ferrera to talk about the highly-anticipated film. There, he revealed that he had doubts that he could do the character justice.

"Up until this point [signing on for the film], I only knew Ken from afar," he explained. "I didn't know Ken from within. If I'm being really honest, I doubted my Kenergy. I didn't see it, but Margot and Greta, they conjured this out of me somehow."

Of course, we can't talk about Ken without acknowledging the titular Barbie (Margot Robbie), the multi-careered icon that enters the real world in the film. We've already seen how endearing the two are together on-screen, and it sounds like that energy was captured off-screen as well. Thank goodness for that! According to Ryan Gosling, the input of Robbie and Greta Gerwig, who also co-wrote the film with Noah Baumbach, was the motivation he needed to truly embrace his stowed-away himbo-ness.

"I was living my life, then one day, I was bleaching my hair, shaving my legs, and wearing bespoke neon outfits and rollerblading down Venice Beach," Gosling explained. "It came on like a fever, really."

As my dear colleague BJ once predicted, he truly has been yassified. And that fever Gosling said he caught after embracing his Kenergy? Well, it has already swept the internet. Ever since the first full-length "Barbie" trailer dropped, Gosling has been hyped as the potentially-unexpected MVP of the film, with even his brief appearances capturing the absurdity of a doll pretending to be human. Remember that line delivery of "'Cause we're girlfriend and boyfriend?" I sure do, and dear reader, I will not be forgetting it any time soon.

It remains to be seen what Kenergy truly entails, but that's okay. We'll all find out when "Barbie" hits theaters on July 21, 2023.