Reese Witherspoon to Star in ‘Barbie’ Origin Film
Actress Reese Witherspoon and her production company have partnered with Bruna Papandrea to produce a biopic film about the woman who created the Barbie doll.
According to Variety, the film will be an origin story for the creation and eventual marketing of the famous doll that has been around now for many decades and generations of young children.
The film itself will be based on the 2010 Robin Gerber novel, "Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World's Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her," which details the creation of the doll by Ruth Handler.
Handler was inspired to create the doll when she saw her daughter (Barbara) playing with paper dolls that were modeled after infants.
She eventually found an adult novelty toy from abroad and reworked the doll to be a children's play toy. The rest, as they say, was history.
She was in the fortunate position to be married to a man who happened to work for Mattel at the time, and the company scooped the doll up and made Barbie a world famous household name for young girls all around.
Witherspoon and Bruna are producing the project, and Bold Films will be financing. It is also expected that Witherspoon will be playing the lead role in the film, but that has not been announced yet.
Michel Litvak, Bold Films' chairman, is also going to be producing on the film, and he had a few things to say about optioning the book for a cinematic portrayal.
"Ruth Handler's inspiring true story reveals the triumphs and struggles of the genius businesswoman behind the creation of Barbie, the most iconic doll in the world," Litvak said.
Bruna has been aggressively pursuing options for novel content that have strong female leads in them. This is something they have done since forming in 2012. Bruna and Witherspoon have also produced the films "Wild" and "Gone Girl," both of which have gone forward to meet critical and box-office success.
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