Greta Gerwig says the reception to her monster hit Barbie has been “the most thrilling thing” to experience.

Speaking at a special screen talk Sunday at the BFI London Film Festival, where she received a rockstar welcome, she said the film’s set had been "the most joyful" she’d ever been on. "So, I thought, if I can make a movie that is half as fun to watch as it was to make, I think maybe we’ve got a shot."

During Barbie‘s opening weekend, Gerwig said she was in New York, but she didn’t wait to hear about the reaction to the film from other people, so she went to get answers for herself.

"I went around to different theaters and sort of stood in the back, and would then also turn up the volume if I felt it wasn’t playing at the perfect level," she claimed. At one such screening, she heard one woman howl with laughter over the joke about the Proust Barbie, one of the numerous specific one-liners she inserted in the film. "And I was like: ‘That joke was for you!'"

Gerwig admitted she wasn't immune to self-doubt while making the movie. The director said she struggled with many creative decisions, notably the "I'm Just Ken" musical number with many Kens fighting on the beach. She said, "That sequence, in particular, was just filled with choices that thrilled me and made me so happy, but then I'd be driving home at the end of the day and thinking…'Oh no!'" That scene was such a standout that it's difficult to think it would have been scrapped if Gerwig hadn't fought to keep it in the film.

Source: Press Release