Billie Eilish has recalled a dark episode while writing a song for the Barbie soundtrack as she dedicated an award for the track to people feeling “existential dread”.
The 22-year-old American singer was honoured along with her songwriter brother, Finneas O’Connell, with the chairman’s gong at the Palm Springs International Film Festival for What Was I Made For? on Thursday.
On stage, Eilish said: “I would really like to say that this award and any, all recognition that this song gets, I just want to dedicate to anyone who experiences hopelessness and the feeling of existential dread, and feeling like: ‘What’s the point? And why am I here, and why am I doing this?’
“I think we all feel like that occasionally, but I think if somebody like me, with the amount of privilege that I have and the incredible things that I get to do and be and how I have really not wanted to be here and – sorry to be dark – damn, but I’ve spent a lot of time feeling that way.
“And I just want to say to anyone who feels that way to be patient with yourself and know that it is, I think, worth it all, and I think it’s great to be alive now.”
She recalled that when her and O’Connell were asked to write this song she “was in a dark episode, I guess, and things didn’t make sense in life”.
Eilish added: “I just didn’t understand what the point was and why you would keep going. (I was) just questioning everything in the world.”
She also spoke about viewing the Greta Gerwig-directed movie with O’Connell, saying: “I was just watching Barbie say and feel things that I really, really, really resonated with and felt so close to. I felt so seen, and I did not expect that.
“I was watching Barbie and seeing things and I think that this movie is the most incredible, most empowering and beautiful and funny and just unbelievable piece of art in the world, and I’m so, so honoured to be a part of it.”
The Devil Wears Prada star Meryl Streep hailed the film, starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, along with the musicians at the ceremony.
While presenting an award to Carey Mulligan, Streep said: “I just want to say to Billie and Finneas that you have delivered the Barbie love bomb. You’ve saved the movies last summer and all of our jobs.
“You’ve delivered joy to countless generations and genders of people, and you should surf that wave, kids, until you’re old and deserve to be jaded like me.”
Barbie became the highest-grossing film of the year at the UK and Ireland box office as the movie. based on the Mattel doll, Barbie raked in £67.5 million three weeks after its release in July.
At the 35th annual Palm Springs International Film Festival Awards, Mulligan received the international star award for Maestro, a biographical based on the life of composer Leonard Bernstein.
