Mattel Exec on Rebooting Barney for Daniel Kaluuya’s Movie and a Max Animated Series — and Is the ‘American Girl’ Doll Movie the Next ‘Barbie’?
From your imagination back to your TV screen, iconic purple dinosaur Barney returns this week with the new animated Max series “Barney’s World.”
In a bid to appeal to what Mattel chief franchise officer Josh Silverman dubs “newstalgia,” the reincarnation of the ’90s sensation is the latest entertainment project from the toy giant, which last year offered up its IP for Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie,” and is now working on a live-action “Barney” movie with Daniel Kaluuya, a film based on the American Girl doll line and a release of a big-budget adaptation of “Masters of the Universe” with Amazon MGM Studios next June.
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“Barney’s World,” which debuted Monday on Max and will have its linear launch Oct. 18 on Cartoon Network, is a prime example of how Mattel’s TV and film groups are working overtime to keep Millennial, Gen Z and preschool-aged consumers (which they prefer to refer to as “fans,” per Silverman) engaged heading into their eight decade of business.
“Next year, we’re going to be celebrating our 80th anniversary for Mattel, which is incredible,” Mattel chief franchise officer Josh Silverman told Variety. “Born in a garage in 1945, and next year is going to be eight decades of Mattel. And we have some incredible, really cool plans to share across the whole portfolio. And the Mattel brand always had resonance, it now has relevance as well, coming off the back of the ‘Barbie’ film. And so we’re really excited to continue to grow the brand and the entire portfolio that exists within it.”
Read Variety‘s interview with Silverman about Mattel’s entertainment and consumer products plans across franchises, including Barney, Barbie, American Girl and more, below.
How did you decide to bring “Barney” back to TV and why did you think now was the right time?
As we looked at our portfolio of brands and franchises, characters and stories, it has incredible depth and breadth. That was one of those incredibly exciting things for me when I joined — look at all these incredible, iconic, multi-generational, universal, well-known pieces of IP. “Barney” was certainly one of the diamonds in the rough that we identified early on. We recognize that “Barney” has a really passionate fan base. Gen Z and Millennials who grew up with the show had an incredible connection. To this day, you can even just whistle a song from “Barney,” and people are like, oh my goodness, I know that. That emotion there is really, really important. Those sense memories, particularly for Gen Z and Millennials, bring you back to this wonderful time in childhood where these stories were so resonant, so important. Many of the fans now are parents, and so we saw this as a really nice opportunity to relaunch the franchise. The insights that we had on “Barney,” and certainly a lot of conversations we had with our fans, showed us the opportunity to really connect with our audience with the term we’re referring to, as “newstalgia.” It refers to something new for this younger generation, so in this case, preschoolers, but nostalgic for people that grew up with it. And the ability for them to do it together is really unique.
We started revitalizing “Barney” over a year ago. We really launched with adult-focused apparel and accessories, a couple streetwear brands, collabs and hoodies, cool T-shirts, retro throwbacks, Crocs. And then we’ve also announced that we have a “Barney” live-action film with Daniel Kaluuya. And this is the first step in a journey. And we’re excited about the show, and we have a lot more planned.
Is the fact the Daniel Kaluuya film is planned as live-action the reason you chose to reboot “Barney” on TV in animated format — to distinguish the two projects, rather than go back to live-action TV too?
No, but our television and films teams work very well together. We’re very much hand in glove and in concert. And Robbie Brenner, who leads our film division, who’s just incredible, she and I spent a ton of time together talking about this. We want to have a clear narrative. In the case here, the “Barney” film will will be what it’s ultimately going to be, and this show, we felt that, we want to remain consistent to the authenticity. That’s really, really important. If it’s not authentic, we’re not going to do it. We want to remain consistent to the authenticity, the DNA of “Barney,” but we also want to modernize. And we thought that an animated show was a way to certainly do that, and certainly be able to connect again to the preschoolers. It’s not to say that we’re not going to do other types of content in the future with “Barney” that we can share more of at some point, but this is just one step in a direction. The show is great, the music’s great, but it wasn’t necessarily to be a departure from the film. We do think about our IP and our content strategy holistically. So everything is very much thoughtful and planned with great insights and ultimately a strategy there. But we want each each offering to live in its own space.
Why did you pick Max as the streamer for the show, considering they are still experimenting with what children’s programming works for them after previous cancellations and strategy shifts?
It starts with a connection. First, we work with almost all the platforms: Netflix, Max, Paramount, Amazon. We really try to create programming and bring our properties to life on platforms where there’s a connection and there’s an interest there. In this case with Max, they are focused on growing their kids business. The folks over there that our team had worked with showed a real passion for the property, which is really, really important. We felt that, given the relationship we had with them, and their eagerness to support it, it was a great home for it. We obviously worked with them on “Barbie,” and they’ve done a really great job, and we’re excited to have the show there. We’ll also have it on Cartoon Network. And then, ultimately, as we hit the international markets, we will continue to expand the distribution eventually, get to free-to-air, and on and on.
Did certain networks or streamers take themselves out of the running — like Peacock, which had the Barney, “I Love You, You Hate Me”? Did that doc affect your decisions when bringing “Barney” back for a TV series?
The documentary wasn’t a consideration here at all. Our fans for “Barney” are passionate, and people have points of view to share, and that’s OK. We respect that. But we really feel good about making sure that we’re telling the right story to the audience and celebrating all the incredible things that make Barney so unique and again and, even now, so important. The positivity, the optimism, the loving yourself, the care, the kindness. These are things I think we need to all hold on to at all times, and especially making sure that preschoolers have that opportunity to really dive in and learn those lessons and have the ability to celebrate it in a fun way with song, more often than not.
Mattel had a huge year last year with the “Barbie” movie. Moving forward, what is Mattel looking to do to keep that momentum going and how much are you relying on existing IP and how much are you expanding into new territory?
One of the incredible things about our company is that portfolio of IP. “Barbie” was amazing and evergreen and iconic prior to the film, certainly during the film, and now post-filmsthis year, celebrating her 65th anniversary and will continue to be a true cultural moment. We take great care in ensuring that we know everything we do is relatable, authentic, inspirational, aspirational. We really think of our consumers as fans. And why that’s important is because it allows us to really think about who they are, where are they, what are they interested in, and it expands our aperture, and the opportunity for us to connect with them wherever and whenever they want to engage with these stories. And so whether it’s a live experience, in the case of “Hot Wheels,” we have a “Hot Wheels” monster truck, we’re opening a park, or we have incredible offerings across digital gaming, wave have “Hot Wheels Let’s Race” on Netflix, which has been absolutely phenomenal — the goal for us is to really begin to pull together and orchestrate a way where our fans have, in all their various day parts, the ability to engage deeply. And I would be remiss if I didn’t highlight my excitement for “Masters of the Universe.” Talk about world building; June 26 is gonna be incredible. And we are so excited Travis Knight directing, we’ve announced a number of cast, Nicholas Galitzine. And it’s something that we’re gonna certainly turn the volume up on a little bit as we continue to ramp up. We want to continue to extend our iconic IP, sometimes it’ll be to relaunch, in the case of “Barney,” or leverage and tell new stories that could go in any different direction.
Mattel is currently working on an “American Girl” movie. Do you see that being your next “Barbie,” given the way fans interact with the history and lore behind those dolls and the meta nature it could take on?
We treat all our IP in some ways discrete, and we want to tell those stories and engage with our fans in a way that is meaningful to them, and so it’s not a contrast or comparison. We really want to lean in and love the IP and make sure that we’re delivering to the fans the things that they would expect, but also what they don’t expect. I think that’s that’s a real power for us is to be looking around corners and anticipating wants and needs and create things that are frame-breaking and surprise and delight with whimsy. When it comes to American Girl, it is the pioneer in experiential retail. It was the first, and continues to be, in my mind, the best. Mattell does a lot in live experiences, locations, entertainment, experiential. But the authentic article, the originator, was American Girl. The audience is ages zero to 99. People love the stories and it ties into both history, “The Care and Keeping of You,” there’s Girl of the Year. There’s so many elements that you can enter the story through for developing films, developing some television content.
How are you all are adapting in the gaming space with what today’s kids have access to, in terms of advancing tech? How are you balancing the physical experience of toys, but also meeting them, realistically, where they’re at a lot of the time: on devices?
We benefit from the tactile nature of toys, and toys are foundational to what we do. The play patterns that exist over decades have proven to be really connecting and engaging to our fans. The ability to play with a doll or race your Hot Wheels, whatever it may be, that is foundational for us. What we do on the digital game side is extend that story. We had a great partnership on Roblox with “Barbie Dream House Tycoon.” It launched at the tail end of last year, was there largely in only the fourth quarter, and was the largest branded game launch the year for Roblox which is over 285 million unique visits in a relatively short period of time and still remains one of their top branded games. What we really want to do is connect the ability to play with a toy and then extend that into a digital world. It’s very natural, now more than ever before. We license to a number of top tier, AAA partners. We have our joint venture with NetEase. We’ve recently announced that beyond those partnership models, we’re going to start to self publish our own mobile games based on our IP and it’s very complementary to our existing licensing and joint venture models.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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