Greta Gerwig’s Barbie is one of the most anticipated movies of the summer.
But Saturday Night Live offered an alternative, or a spinoff, if you like, with American Girls.
The dolls range, which was first released in 1986 by Pleasant Company, features a series of dolls of various ethnicities, faiths, and social classes from different time periods throughout history with accompanying stories.
This summer, according to SNL, comes a live-action movie about historically accurate dolls with their own “harrowing” backstory including an orphan from Victorian times, one doll whose friend died of cholera, one with glasses, one whose dad was a prisoner of war and one who was a runaway slave.
Heidi Gardner, Molly Kearney, Chloe Fineman, Sarah Sherman and host Ana De Armas portrayed the dolls in the sketch.
“Not all dolls live in a dream, some are bigger, younger, sadder, some dolls are American Girls,” said the voiceover. “Did all their family members die of old timey diseases? Absolutely.”
It marks the second time that American Girls have been referenced on SNL this season, following a sketch during the Travis Kelce-hosted episode.
The irony? There have been a number of American Dolls movies, albeit not quite as meta as the Barbie film, which stars Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling. Julia Robert’s Red Om production company was involved in a 2004 movie: Samantha: An American Girl Holiday as well as a number of spinoffs, while HBO released An American Girl: Chrissa Stands Strong in 2009.
In 2019, it also emerged that Mattel, MGM and Picturestart’s Erik Feig teamed up to develop a new live-action movie. We’ve yet to hear more about this project, but perhaps they’ll take their cues from SNL.