As the great screenwriter William Goldman once wrote in his book “Adventures in the Screen Trade,” when it comes to generating successful films in Hollywood, “nobody knows anything.” The astute observation Goldman was making is an evergreen one, which is that despite the film industry’s constant quest to minimize risk and maximize profits, there exists no surefire formula for a movie’s financial victory. Although we’re going through a particularly bad moment in time when it comes to studios and other financiers assuming (incorrectly, of course) that any work adapted from intellectual property will be a hit, this mentality has plagued the movie business practically since it began. Due to this, the issue has cropped up during the production of literally every movie ever made, and most often in the dumbest of ways.
While there can be some understandable logic to executives and distributors being wary of films that seem too aggressively antagonistic or feel too undercooked, there are endless stories about studio folks being weirdly nitpicky about the silliest things. One such story involves the film “John Wick,” a movie that nearly didn’t get a theatrical release 10 years ago, as it was originally slated to be a video-on-demand venture that would be entitled “Scorn.” Once the film gained enough traction and buzz to be considered for theaters, the financiers behind it started fretting about the tiniest details that they believed could spell disaster for the movie’s success. And what about “John Wick” gave them the willies? Was it a certain actor’s casting, or the movie’s brutal violence, or its comic-book-and-classic-literature-inspired mythology? Nope! It was star Keanu Reeves’ beard. That’s right; Reeves’ facial hair almost did the impossible, as it nearly killed “John Wick.”
Reeves barely avoids a close shave
It would’ve been one thing if Reeves was merely being lazy or obstinate when it came to refusing to shave his beard to portray John Wick, but this was not the case. As director Chad Stahelski recently recalled while speaking to Business Insider (via Variety), keeping the beard was actually a creative decision, something that would visually represent the film’s tone:
“We were trying to do a modern-day Greek mythology fantasy movie. That’s not mainstream. So we wanted to do something cool with Keanu. But the money people, they wanted to see Keanu f—ing Reeves. ‘Point Break’ Keanu, ‘Speed’ Keanu. And I don’t know if this exists anymore, but at the time we were told by the powers that be you don’t cover up your leading man’s face with a beard.”
Co-director David Leitch echoed Stahelski’s comments by explaining that arguments over facial hair have continued to crop up in his solo directing career:
“I don’t want to get into it, but since then I have had contentious conversations about stars having facial hair. ‘He needs to be clean-shaven for international!’ That’s the classic studio line.”
As Leitch’s comment indicates, the financier’s cold feet over something seemingly as trivial as facial hair point to the root of the issue, which is that most executives are worried that an actor will be too unrecognizable or different-looking to capitalize on their star power. Granted, if the money folks are paying an actor big bucks to be in their film for their marquee value, it’s somewhat understandable why they’d freak out over such a thing. Yet the whole ethos of an actor is to portray a character that serves the material, not to merely sell a product. If everyone is doing their creative jobs properly, it’s much more likely that the work will help sell itself, and it’s that alchemical equation for art that corporate folks still haven’t been able to grasp throughout history.
Fortunately, Leitch and Stahelski stuck to their guns, with the latter recalling how they decided to resolve the issue by … simply making the movie:
“We felt you can’t fire us, so first day of shooting, we had Keanu in the beard, and later that week, when they watched the dailies, with cinematographer Jonathan Sela’s now famous half-light shots, people f—ing loved it.”
How ‘John Wick’ escaped going to the dogs
If you think that Keanu’s beard is far from the most controversial aspect of “John Wick” and are wondering why the money folks behind the film weren’t worried about that element, well, surprise, surprise: they absolutely were. While Reeves’ facial hair was a point of contention, the tragic and brutal murder of John’s gift of a puppy from his deceased wife became a full-blown issue during the making of the movie. For Leitch, the financiers objecting to the inciting incident of dog murder demonstrated that they didn’t fully understand what kind of movie “John Wick” was trying to be:
“We were told, ‘It’s bad luck.’ ‘It’s bad juju.’ ‘It’s “Old Yeller,” you can’t do this!’ ‘No one will want to see this on screen; you’re going to alienate the audience. And I’m like, ‘We’re going to execute people at close range; killing the dog is one thing, but what about the brutal massacre of all these human beings? Are they going to be able to accept that?’ … They didn’t understand that we were making a genre movie. We are genre fans to the core, and we know those hard-boiled moments are what make memorable moments.”
When it came to fighting to keep the moment in the film, Leitch and Stahelski were aided by the influence of their bearded leading man, as Stahelski explained:
“For the next couple of weeks it was suggested that we shoot an alternative ending revealing that the puppy actually isn’t dead. But Keanu stood up for us. … Eventually, they just felt, ‘F—k it, let’s see what these guys can do.'”
Of course, the ironic postscript to both of these issues is that they’re two of the most memorable aspects of “John Wick,” greatly contributing to the film’s overall aesthetic and effect. In other words, without them, the movie would’ve been that much less special and unique, and could’ve easily faded into the background of the cinematic landscape instead of going on to launch a franchise with three hugely successful sequels, a spin-off series and a hotly anticipated sidequel movie to be released next year. As always, the money folks just can’t seem to see the forest for the trees, only understanding in hindsight that a major new franchise was nearly thwarted by their near-sightedness. So the game of “nobody knows anything” continues, with new movies being made every day that have the potential to be a “John Wick”-style hit, some of them succeeding or failing just by a hair (or two).
