Originally, the character of John Wick was a 75-year-old man to be essayed by the likes of Harrison Ford or Clint Eastwood, but Hollywood star Keanu Reeves took the character and transformed it, played it, and put it in the cinema. changed to one. The most iconic characters, reports Variety.
Franchise creator Basil Ivanick has confirmed this in the new book They Shouldn't Have Killed His Dog: The Complete Uncensored Ace-Kicking Oral History of John Wick, Gun Fu, and the New Age of Action.
In the book Variety, quoted by Ivanick (via Entertainment Weekly): "One of my best friends is Charlie Ferraro at UTA, who sent me this script called 'Scorn' from Derek Kolstad. The lead role was a 75-year-old man , 25 years after retiring. It was fun watching Clint Eastwood kick ass. I thought, 'Okay, maybe there's a name or two you can do this with: Clint Eastwood, Harrison Ford.'"
"My second best friend in the world, this guy is Jimmy Darmody, an agent at CAA who represented Keanu at the time," Ivanick continues, "and he said, 'Do you have any action for Keanu Reeves Movies, I remember saying, 'Keanu is one of the great action stars of the last 25 years, what happened to him? What's he doing?' And he was directing his movie 'Man of Tai Chi' and doing '47 Ronin. We give him the script, we tell him, 'Obviously, you're not 75'."
Variety goes on to say that Reeves says in the book that he knew immediately that "John Wick" would be "such a great collaboration", adding, "We all agreed on the potential of the project. It has this John Wick character, but then again." You also have the real world, as well as the underworld like this. This den of thieves who has this honor and a code. It has this emotional connection with John Wick, who is grieving, who has lost the love of his life. And there's this mythical dark past. And I loved the quest he makes to reclaim his life. And the world he moves from to do it."
According to screenwriter Kolstad, it was Reeves himself "who found his talent in [the script] and made it his own." The 'The Matrix' actor liked the script so much that he changed the character so that he could play it.
