Ryan Gosling did not immediately say yes to performing “I’m Just Ken” at the 2024 Oscars.
The actor visited “The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon” to promote “The Fall Guy” and his third time hosting “Saturday Night Live” on April 13. Fallon asked him what his response was when the Academy asked him to perform at the 2024 ceremony, speculating if it was an easy, “Yeah, I have to do this.”
“One hundred percent no,” Gosling answered. “There’s a lot of ways that can go wrong.”
The Oscar nominee also credited his daughters with coaching him in “I’m Just Ken” choreography.
“They know all the choreography than I do, and the songs,” Gosling said. “Oh my god. They’re backstage kind of showing me the moves.”
Fallon jokingly compared it to “Dance Moms” with a role rehearsal as Gosling’s daughters were coaching him, saying “Big smile dad.”
Gosling called the support from his daughters “a team effort.”
“It was their interest in Barbie and their disinterest in Ken that sort of started all of this. It’s really been a team effort, and they were on the film and they came to set when I filmed the number, but a lot of this has no context for them,” Gosling added. “It’s just like a lot of fake tan stains around the house. So I wanted them to come to the dress rehearsal just to give it some kind of context for what had been going on.”
Fallon read some rave reviews of the performance that called it “high camp,” “the greatest Oscar moment in years” and how he “brought the house down” with his performance.
Gosling suggested recruiting The Roots for even better reviews, and Fallon told him to put in a call next time.
Watch the full interview in the video above.
