John Wick was about to be 75, but Keanu Revees landed the role and everything changed

Originally, Keanu Reeves was not supposed to be the star of ‘John Wick’, because despite being the great protagonist of the action genre, the actor had not been the first choice for this film saga for a simple and simple reason: the main role would have been around 75 years old.

In the newly published book, They Wouldn’t Kill His Dog: John Wick’s Complete Uncensored Oral Story, Gun Fu, and the New Age of Action by Edward Gross and Mark A. Alman; was where it was revealed The truth behind Keanu Reeves’ casting in “John Wick”‘.

According to this new book, the character of John Wick would have been around 75 years old with 25 years of retirement and it was predicted that one of the actors who could play him would be Harrison Ford or even Clint Eastwood. Not to mention that the film was originally going to be called “Scorn”.

The character’s age ultimately changed when Keanu Reeves’ then manager Jimmy Darmody got hold of the script for “Scorn” and brought it to the actor, who fell in love with the story immediately and became clinging to it. The production team accepted the actor in the film, but they agreed that he would not be the protagonist … until he himself changed his mind.

We had talked internally about the actors, but it was Keanu Reeves, a voracious reader of screenplays; whatever he puts his hands on, he reads it, whoever put his claws on it and made it to him, “wrote screenwriter Derek Kolstad on the book.

The actor ended up joining the project so much that he helped Derek Kolstad with the script and, little by little, they ended up accepting that Keanu Reeves was the one who brought John Wick to lifewhich would also be the name of the film and of the entire action saga that now bears the face of the popular actor as a watermark, but with a character of 35 and not 75.

Keanu Reeves, the success of John Wick

There are currently four “John Wick” films and a fifth installment is in the works, not to mention that several spin-offs such as “Ballerina” with Ana de Armas are already planned. The expansion was achieved because in addition to the fact that the films were blockbusters, critics hailed each of the installments and, above all, the work of Keanu Reeves in the lead role.

This is why many fans of the saga and even film experts assure that the “John Wick” franchise would not have reached the level of popularity it had if its protagonist had been Harrison Ford or Clint Eastwood instead of Keanu Reeves; Well, he is the actor who has won all this time for his performance, charisma and action sequences.