‘Barbie’ Music Wins Big at the Grammys as Billie Eilish Praises Director Greta Gerwig

Barbie came into the 2024 Grammys with 11 nominations and went home with three of them.

Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell won song of the year for “What Was I Made For?” Their fellow contenders included Lana Del Rey’s “A&W,” Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” Jon Batiste’s “Butterfly,” Dua Lipa’s “Dance the Night” also from Barbie, Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers,” SZA’s “Kill Bill” and Olivia Rodrigo’s “Vampire.”

During her acceptance speech, Eilish gave a special shout-out to Barbie director Greta Gerwig for “making the best movie of the year,” seemingly referencing the fact that the filmmaker was snubbed for the best director category at the Oscars this year.

In a conversation with reporters in the press room after their win, Eilish explained that she and her brother had hit a bit of a roadblock with their songwriting before getting the opportunity to write for the film’s soundtrack.

“We had been working three days a week and not coming up with stuff, and even if we were coming up with stuff it just didn’t feel right, didn’t feel good, didn’t feel real,” she said. “And I got really worried, I got nervous, I felt like it was going to be over a little bit. I was in a real dark place, really, really dark place, it’s kind of hard to think back to it, but Greta came to us, and she offered us this life-changing thing we didn’t really realize was going to be life-changing like that, and we wrote [‘What Was I Made For?’] 24 hours after we saw the movie.”

The emotional ballad received the trophy for best song written for visual media, where it was competing against three other songs from Barbie — Dua Lipa’s “Dance the Night,” Ryan Gosling’s “I’m Just Ken” and Nicki Minaj and Ice Spice’s “Barbie World” — as well as Rihanna’s “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.

Barbie the Album took home the Grammy for best compilation soundtrack for visual media. Daisy Jones & the Six, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3: Awesome Mix, Vol. 3 and Weird: The Al Yankovic Story were also up for the award.

See some of the best dressed celebrities on the 2024 Grammys red carpet.