When Warner Bros announced to the world that their upcoming blockbuster film, “Barbie,” would hit theaters on the same day as Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer,” few could have imagined that this would become the ingredients for the biggest movie event since maybe “Avengers: Endgame” or “Spiderman: No Way Home.” But behind the wholesome movie experience that “Barbenheimer” became, is the story the battle between Cristopher Nolan and Warner.
The year 2020 was a rough one for everyone running a business that relied on customers walking through a door, and theaters, which had been struggling even before the pandemic, were no exception. However, one man’s loss is another man’s gain, and movie studios began pushing all of their catalog into their own streaming services in an effort to profit from the millions of people who were stuck at home with nothing better to do. For the studios, it was a no-brainer: skip the middleman and deliver your content directly to customers who showed a reluctance to hit the theaters, even if it meant waiting a few extra weeks to watch from the comfort of their living rooms.
One of these studios was Warner Media, which, in late 2020, made the controversial decision to release all 17 of their upcoming films exclusively on its streaming service. The decision was heavily criticized by none other than Christopher Nolan, who for years has been one of the biggest advocates for the movie-going experience. Nolan voiced his discontent to The Hollywood Reporter: “Some of our industry’s biggest filmmakers and most important movie stars went to bed the night before thinking they were working for the greatest movie studio and woke up to find out they were working for the worst streaming service.” The situation worsened when the movie flopped upon its theatrical release in September 2020, earning only $364 million at the box office and being regarded as one of Nolan’s weakest entries. The poor box office performance, combined with a lack of communication and the unilateral decision to release the movie directly to streaming, strained the almost two-decade-long relationship between Nolan and Warner. Warner lost a historically successful director, and Nolan lost the support of a studio known for backing director-driven projects.
As Nolan began searching for a new home for his upcoming project, many believed that the breakup marked the end of an era for the theatrical experience. It was a chronicle of a death unfolding for movie theaters, a death that not even Nicole Kidman gaslighting us into going back to the cinema could save them from.
But sometimes foreshadowing is relatively obvious.
Fast forward to September 2021. Nolan found a new home for his upcoming project: “Oppenheimer” at Universal. “Oppenheimer,” a $100 million dollar, 181-minute biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer was slated for release on June 21, 2023, Nolan’s preferred season. Coincidentally, Warner had initially scheduled a movie to be released on the same date, June 21. The movie in question? The long-awaited movie of a beloved character: “Coyote vs. Acme.” However, on April 22, Warner made the decision to swap “Coyote vs. Acme” with “Barbie.”
“Barbie” was a project that Warner had been cooking for a long time. After some initial behind-the-scenes problems, the project finally fell into the hands of critically acclaimed director Greta Gerwig, who co-wrote the film with her husband, Noah Baumbach. Add some star power in the forms of Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, a $145 million budget with roughly the same amount for marketing, and you got yourself an absolute blockbuster juggernaut.
Now the decision of moving the release date for “Barbie” to directly compete with “Oppenheimer” made no sense from a business point of view. In fact, studios avoid doing this kind of thing as it usually results in both films having to split the box office. However, some sources claimed that, allegedly, this decision had to do more with personal reasons. Warner intentionally changed the release date of “Barbie” in order to spite Christopher Nolan since they were convinced that, at the end of the day, their movie would come out on top. Especially if you take into account that apart from a couple of billboard countdowns with the movie name on them, which were a huge letdown once they got to 0, the marketing campaign for “Oppenheimer” was non-existent despite having $100 million dollars destined to the cause.
When Christopher Nolan was asked in the same Insider article if he believed the change of date was due to his complex relationship with Warner, he simply responded: “Now, you must know I’m not going to answer that question.” Nevertheless, sources indicated that behind the scenes, the decision left him frustrated, as he attempted to persuade Warner to change the release date to no avail.
According to Know Your Meme, the first use of the term “Barbenheimer” can be traced all the way back to a tweet (yes, we are not calling it X) made by Matt Neglia, editor-in-chief for the entertainment awards website Best Next Picture, on April 15th, 2022. The same site also claims that the first viral use of the term was made on January 1st, 2023 with the caption: “7 months and 21 days until Barbenheimer,” From this point on the phrase would evolve into fan made posters, merch and of course, memes giving rise to the idea of a double feature—a somewhat foreign concept for newer generations.
The Barbenheimer meme eventually made it’s way into mainstream, featuring in press junkets throughout Hollywood. Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie where the first ones to embrace the meme, posing with tickets for both films. Actors from both casts and around Hollywood praise the idea reminiscing about the days they spent hours on the cinema. Director Francis Ford Coppola called the box office success of both films “a victory for cinema” meanwhile Martin Scorsese called the event a, “perfect storm” that offered hope for a “different cinema to emerge.”. Even Tom Cruise posed with tickets for both films while his own Mission Impossible film was still on cinemas. It took some time, perhaps due to his knowledge of the full story, but eventually Nolan warmed up to the idea, stating in an IGN interview: “I think for those of us who care about movies, we’ve been really waiting to have a crowded marketplace again, and now it’s here and that’s terrific.”
In the end, this is one of those rare stories where everybody won. The studios made their money back and more, theaters got a healthy boost on box-office revenue, which was still recovering from the pandemic, and audiences got a unique movie going experience watching two truly great pieces of cinema. But if we had to pick one winner it would be Cristopher Nolan. In one of those weird instances where trying to prevent a prophecy ends up fulfilling it, Warner’s attempt to screw Nolan ended up giving him everything that he wanted. By defending his vision and passion for the so called theatrical experience, Nolan sowed the seeds of what would later become one of the decade’s most significant cinematic events.