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Kousha Navidar: This is All Of It. I'm Kousha Navidar, in for Alison Stewart. Happy Juneteenth. I want you to take a second and imagine what a Barbie looks like. Envision her, from top to bottom. I'll give you a second. More than likely, no matter what you look like, you probably envisioned a white, thin, blonde-haired, and blue-eyed doll, and the reality is, for a long time, you'd be correct. After Barbie was released in 1959, it took two decades before the first ever Black Barbie was created.

It's this journey that Lagueria Davis explores in her new documentary, simply called Black Barbie. The doc follows the journey of Mattel and the Black women on the inside who pushed boundaries and opened the doors of inclusivity. It's about how crucial dolls like Barbie are to the self-esteem of young children. It also features appearances from Congresswoman Maxine Waters, executive producer Shonda Rhimes, actor Gabourey Sidibe, and ballerina Misty Copeland, all who speak about the importance of the doll in their lives and beyond.

Today, we have the pleasure of speaking with the director of the doc. Hi, Lagueria, welcome to the show.

Lagueria Davis: Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Kousha Navidar: Yes. Thank you for coming. Welcome to All Of It. By the way, happy release day.

Lagueria Davis: Yes. Black Barbie has finally arrived. Thank you.

Kousha Navidar: Today is obviously Juneteenth. How does it feel to be releasing this doc on such an important holiday in American history?

Lagueria Davis: It just feels like we're continuing the celebration of Black Barbie and the women behind her. It's just amazing that this is our release date.

Kousha Navidar: Yes. Let's get into the doc itself, within the first few minutes of making the documentary, I thought it was really wild that you mentioned that you hate dolls. Why make this documentary?

Lagueria Davis: Someone actually told me that hate was a strong word to use, and I really sat with that. I think when it comes to hate, it's from a lack of understanding. At least for me, that's what it means. I set out to understand why my aunt loves dolls, why she collects Black dolls. On that journey of understanding, it led me to Black Barbie's story.

Kousha Navidar: You mentioned your aunt, who is Beulah Mae Mitchell, was an employee at Mattel for over 40 years. We're going to get to her in a second. I'm wondering, before that, what are your first memories of Barbie?

Lagueria Davis: For me, my first memories of Barbie is definitely what you said, blonde hair, blued eyed. Since I hate dolls, and hated dolls, I didn't really play with her much, so she really wasn't a part of my childhood in a significant way, but as you watch the documentary, I kind of unpack that a little more and realize that I just didn't have the words to articulate what she meant to me at that time.

Kousha Navidar: It's interesting to think about this being a journey for yourself, like you said, to try to understand Black Barbie, and not just its genesis, but its place in the culture. For you, when you were starting the documentary, do you feel like you started with a different set of expectations than you ended with? Was there something that you learned along the way that you were really surprised about, that changed the framing of what you were expecting?

Lagueria Davis: Yes. I definitely came in trying to understand, but also thinking, "It's a toy, it's fashion, it's vapid," and it turned out to be so much more than that. My expectations and perspective really shifted during the making of the documentary, to be honest.

Kousha Navidar: It's so interesting that you have this familial connection there, that's so deep. Tell us a little bit about your aunt Beulah. What's she like? What's her place in the documentary? What's her history like?

Lagueria Davis: Oh, yes. When I moved to LA as a filmmaker in 2011, I stayed with my aunt, and in her house, the room where I was sleeping was full of dolls. I knew that she worked for Mattel, but I didn't know her story. She sat me down and she told me her story about working for Mattel for 45 years, being on that first Barbie line, living this history, befriending Ruth, and asking, "Why not make a Black Barbie? Why not make a doll that looks like me?"

As a filmmaker, I was struck by that, I was like, "This is a story I've never really heard." Barbie, the making of her journey through the lens of a Black woman like my aunt Beulah Mae Mitchell, who is was a whippersnapper. That was 13 years ago. I can't do the math. I've been up for a long time, and it's still early. She's like 86 now. She was 13 years younger then--

Kousha Navidar: 73.

Lagueria Davis: Okay. Great. Awesome.

Kousha Navidar: I got your back. [laughs]

Lagueria Davis: Thank you for doing that math. 73. She was 73, and a whipper snapper. She never meets a stranger. She can talk to a tree. She's just a lovely, warm individual. I can't wait for the audience to meet her in the documentary. She basically was one of the first Black women to move into the corporate office at Mattel. She really was instrumental in laying that groundwork that enabled the next step in hiring Kitty Black Perkins.

The first Black woman designer that Mattel would hire in 1976, who would go on to design the very first Black Barbie that was released in 1980.

Kousha Navidar: Beulah Mae's personality really shines through. In this documentary, I'm wondering, what was it like when you first approached her about appearing in the doc, did she take any wrestling to get into it, or was she totally game from the top?

Lagueria Davis: She was pretty game from the top, even though she didn't understand several things. She didn't understand how it was a story, because she was like, "I'm a peon. I'm a nobody. I just happened to work at this company and have all of this wonderful memorabilia, then Ruth Handler's mentioned in her book," and all of these things, and I'm like, "Are you kidding me? This is fantastic. This is amazing."

Being a family member, she so wanted to see me succeed that she was like, "Of course, I'll do this documentary with you. No problem. Just tell me what you need from me." It wasn't anything. I recently learned that she also was instrumental in getting Kitty on board for the documentary as well. That was a really fun story for me to learn a couple of weeks ago.

Kousha Navidar: Since we've mentioned Ruth's name a couple of times, just want to put that for listeners. Ruth Handler was an American businesswoman, an investor, also the inventor of Barbie, right, Lagueria?

Lagueria Davis: Yes, that's correct. Yes.

Kousha Navidar: I'm thinking about the making of the doc, because in the doc, you spent a lot of time looking at dolls to make this project. You use real Barbies as part of your storytelling, by using them to show real-life dynamics that you're talking about. I thought that was such an interesting choice. Can you tell us about that choice of how to include the dolls themselves, and maybe a little bit of what the experience was like shooting them?

Lagueria Davis: Oh, yes, absolutely. This miniature set and doll play was, from the beginning, something that I wanted to do, because I was like, "You can't talk about Barbie without playing with Barbie." As the story evolved and I started to have an understanding that people really resonated with the personal connection and having me be some form of character in the film, that, then, it just made sense, as I speak about little Lagueria, and unpacking my doll play as a childhood-- or lack of doll play in my childhood.

It felt really fun to think, in terms of, "Okay, this is finally Lagueria playing with Barbies." With that being the case, the sets, I really started to have an imagination, and wanted to explore what it meant to navigate white spaces as other-- and put that into the play.

Kousha Navidar: It sounds you really tapped into your inner child when you're trying to understand the power of the Barbie doll. Is that fair?

Lagueria Davis: Yes. It is very much fair.

Kousha Navidar: How did that affect you during the filming of this project? The project has taken years to finally come out to audience members. How has that impacted you personally?

Lagueria Davis: It has been an emotional journey, definitely, from the industry, being in the rooms with this project, and somewhat thinking in terms of the parallels, from making the Black Barbie doll to making the Black Barbie doc. Having an understanding of how little has changed. At one point, I was like, "Please don't make it take 21 years for the Black Barbie doc to be something that is out in the world." Thankfully, it only took the 13 years, not 21 years. I'm grateful for that.

Kousha Navidar: You talk about being in the room itself, of filming it. There are a lot of powerful Black women that you highlight in the documentary. How did you choose who you wanted to feature?

Lagueria Davis: It felt just so organic in the sense of wanting to sit down with a wide swatch of people to illustrate that it's not a monolithic experience navigating white spaces as a Black person. That meant just having a myriad of voices in the film, from, like you said, the powerhouse women that we have in the film, from Shonda to Misty to Ibtihaj, Rep Waters, to Monica Bailey, Yolanda Hester.

It was very important to me to show that everyone matters and has value, which, sometimes, I feel the way we kind of roll things out and the way we place importance on things that are more white-centered. I think it was just important to be as intentional as possible. Our producer says, Aaliyah Williams, "This is a love letter to Black women and Black girls." We just wanted to make a project where, first and foremost, that audience felt seen and heard."

Kousha Navidar: It was really lovely, and, I think, provocative to see these individuals talk about the role that Barbie played in their lives as children. What were some of the most fun stories that you heard? Maybe you just pick one out, that really comes to mind. You're like, "Wow, that was surprising. I'm really happy that I heard that."

Lagueria Davis: Well, Byronique, she's in the film, and she is a self-proclaimed Black Barbie. She's so delightful, and I think, for me, listening to her talk about how Black Barbie has inspired her, and she walks around her day being like, "What would Black Barbie do?" There was a story of her just-- We had it in the festival cut of the film, but unfortunately, for the sake of time, that was trimmed out.

She brought out the only toy she had remaining from childhood, was a Barbie pink Corvette, and she really wanted one of those in real life. She does a whole genie nod, like, "I wish I could just blow it up and hop in it," and if Barbie just needs a two-seater, that's all she needs. It was so fun. I think in her interview, it really started to shift my perspective of just how inspiring Barbie could be, and is, for a lot of people. That taps into our tagline more than a doll.

Kousha Navidar: We're talking with Lagueria Davis, who's the director of the Black Barbie documentary. It's out today on Netflix. We're going to take a quick break, when we come back, we're going to talk a little bit more about Mattel, hear a clip from the show, and talk a little bit about the impact that Barbie's having on kids today. Stay with us.

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This is All Of It, on WNYC. I'm Kousha Navidar, and we're talking with Lagueria Davis, who's the director of the Black Barbie documentary. It's out today on Netflix. We're talking about the documentary, talking about the impact that Black Barbie has had, and is having in our culture today. Lagueria, one of the most, I think, interesting and gripping parts of the documentary was actually hearing from Mattel for me.

I thought it was very interesting that you got Mattel into the documentary, especially since the documentary does feature a lot of their shortcomings. There's one moment in particular where you mentioned the Barbie TV series, and how the attempt to be progressive has fallen flat. Can you talk a little bit about that, and then also just what your experience was like hearing Mattel talk about their efforts for centering Black Barbie more?

Lagueria Davis: Yes. I am glad that landed for you. Thinking in terms of what's progressive and what's progress, it just depends on the lens you're looking at the situation through, is my opinion and hot take on it. On one hand, I can see, in terms of-- and depending on the team. We emphasize the team in Black Barbie, depending on the team behind that project that you spoke of, the Big City, Big Dreams movie, where they introduced Brooklyn Barbie, and the intention behind it.

I think what our film was able to say was, "This is an effort to do something that feels progressive," but unfortunately, the intention behind it really doesn't serve the progress that they're trying to make, if that makes sense. It does matter how we show up and how a character is introduced, and if someone was on the team, to help explore how to introduce this Black Barbie, Brooklyn, in a way that's supposed to be main character energy, then from this lens, it necessarily wasn't the main character energy we were looking for.

Sitting down with Mattel, it was apparent that they felt differently about it.

Kousha Navidar: What did you make of that? I love that phrase, main character energy. I think that's the perfect euphemism for exactly what they're trying to go for there. Do you feel they're moving in the right direction, or do you feel like they were-- I suppose what I'm trying to ask here is, what they were doing on along the way, or did you see them shooting themselves in their own feet?

Lagueria Davis: I feel like having an understanding of what real-- I think Antoine, in our film, really says, true diversity and inclusion looks like. There's a conversation that's playing in my head, where it's like-- If there were people of color, Black people involved in the making of that. Tasja Kirkwood, in the film, from Mattel, talks about diversity of thought. How was their input? Was there input after the fact, like a sign-off, if you will, saying, "Okay, that works," or were they a part of the creative process?

Honestly, I don't know how that story came to be, and the people behind it. For us, it was just important to point out the shortcomings of not having the people at the table to really help shepherd the creative. What we laid out before, with Kitty, and her design, intentional, so intentional design for Black Barbie, and the worlds of Black Barbies that she created, and Stacey and her intention behind the 30th anniversary of Black Barbie, and the worlds of Black Barbies that she created. All of that matters.

Kousha Navidar: We're talking with Lagueria Davis, the director of Black Barbie, out today. Sorry to interrupt you there, but you brought up a really good point, especially when you were talking about how big of an impact this can make, and the specificity with which Black Barbie was designed. Another huge part of your documentary, that struck me, at least, was with self-esteem, and how dolls can often be deemed as trivial, but they're actually crucial to the self-esteem of the children playing with them.

We're going to listen to a clip of someone discussing this. Here it is.

Monica Bailey: The eyes that were blue, I'd get a colored crayon or a marker, and literally color the eyes brown. All the Barbies I had, there were white Barbies and I felt like I needed to look like them, but having that to be a standard made me feel, myself and other Black girls, feel inadequate. I was like, "I need to look like them. I need to be them." I remember that. I'm getting chills thinking about that right now. It was very-- [sighs] Yes. Wow. I wasn't expecting that. [laughs]

Kousha Navidar: Lagueria, in the beginning of the film, you mentioned the famous 1940 doll experiment, where even Black children favor white dolls, and by the end of the movie, you feature a modern-day version of it. Can you walk us through both experiments and why it was important to include them in the doc?

Lagueria Davis: Yes. The 1940s doll test, by Dr. Mamie and Kenneth Clark, two Black psychologists, who were married, decided to find out how segregation affected Black children, by using a Black doll and a white doll. They asked the children questions like, "Which one is the good doll? Which one is the bad doll? Which one is the ugly doll? Which one of these dolls look like you?" The findings of that doll test was that a majority of Black children said the bad doll was the Black doll, the good doll was the white doll.

Then the struggle of having to identify themselves, when they got to that question of which one looks like you, with the doll that they had previously said was bad and ugly. The findings of that was used in the Brown versus Board of Education and the desegregation of schools. For me, knowing that part of history, it felt important to sit down with the children in Act 3. It's three-act structure, past, present, future. With the future, we're sitting down with children.

Dr. Amirah Saafir was able to build out this really great experiment test, if you will, a reimagining of the doll test, that's what I say, for us and the documentary, and it just felt so important to have this piece, to get a sense of how much has changed.

Kousha Navidar: Did you feel like anything had changed when you were watching that modern-day version?

Lagueria Davis: What was so amazing was, I didn't know what to expect. It exceeded my expectation, just how strong of a foundation these children had. They felt very fortified, their Black is beautiful, and their Black is everything positive and good. Then, watching the film, it does take a turn and you can see where the cracks are starting to come in. For me, it just was proof of, no matter how much your parents and your family try to give you that strong foundation, it's hard to compete with the outside forces that are telling you differently.

Kousha Navidar: There's no Black designers, currently, on the design team, so I'm wondering, after doing this doc, what does the future of Black Barbie look like to you, ideally?

Lagueria Davis: Ideally, what we're seeing with the next iteration of Black Barbie, which-- they usually go in 10 years. Maybe we'd be looking at a 50th-anniversary Black Barbie. Really, intentionally picking up that torch from my aunt, to Kitty, to Stacey, with Kitty and Stacey mentoring the next them who are at Mattel. That's what that looks like for me. By the next them, I mean another Black woman designer who is at the table seeing a need and working with the people at Mattel to meet those needs in a very intentional way.

That would be amazing for the legacy of Black Barbie. As for bringing Black Barbie into the media with that main character energy, in my personal opinion, we haven't seen it yet. I'm wanting to see that as well.

Kousha Navidar: Lagueria Davis is the director of the Black Barbie documentary. It's out today on Netflix. Lagueria, thank you for your work and for showing that main character energy to Barbie. We really appreciate it. Thanks so much for hopping on.

Lagueria Davis: Thanks for having me.

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