--- title: Christmas 2015: Ava DuVernay Barbie Doll Goes on Sale description: The filmmaker announces release of her very own Barbie doll. canonical: https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/ author: Entertainment Weekly article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-07T14:37:55.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:27:25.117Z og:title: Filmmaker Ava DuVernay's Look-Alike Barbie Doll Goes on Sale og:description: "A beautiful, Black, filmmakin’ Barbie with locs!" og:url: https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf0dfb099fdc8eaff/698873fa2dce01810c9e6cd0/ava-duvernay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2496 og:image:height: 1404 og:image:alt: Ava DuVernay attends the "Belief" premiere in New York City on Oct. 14, 2015. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Filmmaker Ava DuVernay's Look-Alike Barbie Doll Goes on Sale twitter:description: "A beautiful, Black, filmmakin’ Barbie with locs!" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf0dfb099fdc8eaff/698873fa2dce01810c9e6cd0/ava-duvernay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # _Selma_ Director Ava DuVernay Barbie Doll Now on Sale > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. by [Jessica Derschowitz / Entertainment Weekly](https://time.com/author/entertainment-weekly/) ## Jessica Derschowitz / Entertainment Weekly Dec 7, 2015 2:37 PM UTC  Ava DuVernay attends the "Belief" premiere in New York City on Oct. 14, 2015. Ava DuVernay attends the "Belief" premiere in New York City on Oct. 14, 2015.Dimitrios Kambouris—WireImage/Getty Images by [Jessica Derschowitz / Entertainment Weekly](https://time.com/author/entertainment-weekly/) ## Jessica Derschowitz / Entertainment Weekly Dec 7, 2015 2:37 PM UTC The Barbie doll made in _Selma_ director Ava DuVernay’s likeness earlier this year is now available for purchase thanks to demand from fans. “Tomorrow this [#AvaBarbie](https://twitter.com/hashtag/AvaBarbie?src=hash) goes on sale for Christmas because enough folks asked [@Mattel](https://twitter.com/Mattel) to do so. Wild + wonderful,” DuVernay tweeted on Sunday. She added that proceeds from sales of the doll will benefit Color of Change and Witness.org. > [](https://twitter.com/AVAETC/status/673625255999500289) > [](https://twitter.com/AVAETC/status/673629095100440576) The official Barbie Twitter account also [confirmed the doll will be available to purchase](https://twitter.com/Barbie/status/673729314668457985) starting Monday, but did not give details on where to buy or how much the doll would cost. DuVernay’s look-alike doll [was created earlier this year](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/04/24/check-out-ava-duvernays-look-alike-barbie-doll-0) as part of Mattel’s “Shero” campaign, which honored six real-life women and their accomplishments in entertainment (the other women who had dolls created were actresses Emmy Rossum and Kristin Chenoweth, 5-year-old fashion designer Sydney Kaiser, singer Trisha Yearwood, and Eva Chen, then the editor-in-chief of _Lucky_ magazine). Each honoree was given the custom-made doll in their likeness to auction for a charity of their choice. “I love that the doll is supposed to have locs like my own,” DuVernay told EW via email in April. “I was a big Barbie girl when I was young. My sisters, Jina and Tera, and I would play for hours making up stories and scenarios. We couldn’t afford all the Barbie furniture and cars, so our Barbies drove around in our skates! And we’d cut socks and put a rubber band around the waist and make their dresses. We cut their hair. We put eye shadow on them with a ballpoint pen! It sounds ratchet, but we thought our Barbies were fly back then! So it’s real cool to now have a Barbie in my own image. I never imagined that. …It’s lovely to be honored, especially with a beautiful, Black, filmmakin’ Barbie with locs!” _This_ [_article_](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/12/07/ava-duvernay-barbie-doll-released) _originally appeared on_ [_EW.com_](http://www.ew.com) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/"},"headline":"Selma Director Ava DuVernay Barbie Doll Now on Sale","datePublished":"2015-12-07T14:37:55.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:27:25.117Z","description":"Mattel made an Ava DuVernay doll after demand from fans","url":"https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Barbie","Toys","celebrity","ava duvernay"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf0dfb099fdc8eaff/698873fa2dce01810c9e6cd0/ava-duvernay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jessica Derschowitz / Entertainment Weekly"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf0dfb099fdc8eaff/698873fa2dce01810c9e6cd0/ava-duvernay.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Ava DuVernay attends the \"Belief\" premiere in New York City on Oct. 14, 2015.","caption":"Ava DuVernay attends the \"Belief\" premiere in New York City on Oct. 14, 2015.","creditText":"Dimitrios Kambouris—WireImage/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4138236/ava-duvernay-barbie/","name":"Selma Director Ava DuVernay Barbie Doll Now on Sale"}}]}] ```