Ryan Gosling’s efficiency of “I’m Simply Ken” was an irony-meets-sincerity spectacle.
Should songs written for motion pictures be critical? Every year the Oscar for Finest Unique Tune nominations over-index on hushed ballads and motivational anthems—music that’s constructed sturdily, predictably, for utilitarian functions. “I’m Simply Ken,” the Barbie monitor carried out by the actor Ryan Gosling, takes that custom and skews it. Half piano confessional and half prog-metal rockout, it’s a deeply foolish tune about self-seriousness. Final night time’s rendition of it was an irony-meets-sincerity cyclone of the very best order, making for essentially the most lovable Oscars music second in years.
Starting his act whereas seated within the viewers, with a cowboy hat obscuring his impossibly angular options, Gosling was in character because the woebegone Ken, a macho hunk doomed to play beta within the toy netherworld of Barbie. He sang over the shoulder of his co-star Margot Robbie, who was not in character. She let loose a genuine-seeming giggle, which set the tone for the quantity as a lot because the fuchsia lighting did. Barbie’s signature perception is that merchandise and folks, the worlds we escape to and the world we stay in, exist not in opposition however in dialogue. So this was going to be a super-performative efficiency—but additionally one wherein the fourth wall can be repeatedly damaged. Gosling took off his hat, plopped it on the pinnacle of an viewers member (his sister), and sauntered as much as the stage.
From there, we acquired a basic movie-musical spectacle, populated totally by males. Mark Ronson, the tune’s co-producer, performed bass guitar together with his shirt billowing open, and Slash of Weapons N’ Roses later appeared for a finale of shredding. On a pink bandstand, tuxedoed dancers wore pink sashes, and introduced pink boards for Gosling to karate-chop. (This was all an homage to “Diamonds Are a Woman’s Finest Buddy,” besides Marilyn Monroe’s model didn’t contain martial arts.) Barbie’s jokey tackle the male ego has been a lot mentioned, however Gosling’s mannerisms final night time conveyed one thing extra poignant than mere satire. He moved slumpily, much less like a plastic doll than a rag doll. His Ken is not only an emblem onto which feminist concepts could be projected, but additionally a personality struggling, in idiosyncratic methods, to determine who he ought to be.
The tempo modified, the set modified, and Gosling stored shifting—shadowboxing, kissing the cameraperson’s hand, crowd-surfing amid a sea of Barbie-face cutouts. The power inbuilt a managed frenzy, bolstered by the grinning participation of Barbie’s different Kens, together with the actors Simu Liu and Kingsley Ben-Adir. Towards the top, in a heat emotional excessive level, Gosling supplied the microphone to the ladies within the viewers who made Barbie what it’s: Robbie, America Ferrera, and the director Greta Gerwig. “I’m sufficient / And I’m nice at doing stuff,” they sang collectively, a really ridiculous lyric that occurred to really feel, in that second, completely correct.
