FACING THE MUSIC
Keanu Reeves has strained relationship with the Bill & Ted characters
The year was 1991, and Keanu Reeves was supposed to be doing publicity for Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. Instead, he seemed intent on sabotaging his new movie.
At the very least, his bizarre press session suggested he had a complicated relationship with both this film and its predecessor, Bill & Ted's Excellent Journey, and also with the huge cult following they had triggered
And now Bill and Ted are back — in what might tactfully be dubbed geriatric territory — with Reeves, 56, and co-star Alex Winter, 55, reprising their roles as a pair of time-travelling slackers in something called Bill & Ted Face the Music. And despite Reeves's insistence over the years that he loves the character of Ted (Theodore) Logan, is it really that clear-cut?
Certainly hostility was in the air 29 years ago when his distinctly grubby figure lurched into the interview room of a Santa Monica hotel and deposited himself at a table full of journalists. Seconds later, the female reporter sitting next to him rose and fled to the other side. “He smells like a goat!” she confided to a colleague.
And indeed, Reeves was having quite a time on that July day. He had roared up to Santa Monica's poshest hotel on his beloved motorcycle and had managed to get past the doorman despite looking as though he'd been camping out on a rubbish dump. One of the hottest young stars of the new decade looked as though he hadn't washed for a month. His hair, sticking up in all directions, was matted with grease and uncombed. He needed a shave and his hands were filthy. His suede jacket was soiled, his jeans stiff with dirt and grease, his boots half-laced.
While journalists gazed at this apparition with fascination, and publicists with horror, Reeves pulled a microphone toward him and belched. When a journalist joked about his appearance, he simulated the sound of breaking wind and followed it up with his choirboy smile.
In those few moments, Reeves had ensured that journalists would be spending more time writing about his conduct than they would about the movie he was supposed to be promoting.
It could be that he was being outrageous in order to conceal his unease with having to talk to reporters at all. With him, even the most innocent question can send the barriers up. Years later, in a promotion tour for the film Constantine, the signs of agitation remained — incessant jiggling in the chair, head-scratching, hands yanking at each other.
Recently, The New York Times ran a Q&A feature allowing Reeves and Winter to discuss their return to Bill and Ted. Winter did most of the talking, with informative, articulate answers. His co-star said as little as he could. Time magazine got it right when it labelled Reeves “Hollywood's ultimate introvert” back in 2005.
This enigmatic loner who grew up in Toronto poses a fascinating conundrum. In the course of a career stretching back more than three decades, Reeves has received an embarrassing number of awful reviews. Yet he has survived, whereas many of his contemporaries have vanished from sight. How come?
Various factors have been at play. One was a decision to abandon the juvenile conduct and start behaving in public. Another was a dogged determination to be taken seriously as an actor, a determination that endured despite many failures and led him to play Hamlet at Winnipeg's Manitoba Theatre Centre — and let it be said that he did not disgrace himself. He also made some shrewd film choices. He saw Speed as a potential superstar-making role, which it was, and then had the good sense to turn down Speed 2 and a $14-million salary because he considered the script to be crap. He took a huge but ultimately productive gamble in hooking up with the Wachowski siblings to make The Matrix trilogy. Then after a further sag in his fortunes, he successfully invoked the spirit of Elizabethan revenge tragedy by embracing the blooddrenched world of John Wick.
In 1994, Reeves had a private sit-down with Postmedia to talk about Speed. When asked about his outrageous behaviour during the infamous junket three years earlier, he didn't flinch.
“Yeah,” he said apologetically. “I had a certain dissatisfaction with that particular film and I was fairly immature, I think, in dealing with that feeling.”
It's clear, in retrospect, that he loved Bill and Ted for their innocent goofiness, and loathed the immense merchandising campaign that had been built around them. He hated the toys, the Nintendo game, the Bill and Ted cereal box. When he behaved outrageously in connection with the release of the second film, he was pushing back.
“It seems that the success of films now depends on things to buy and sell,” he said disdainfully. “I've seen the toy, and the spirit of the toy has nothing to do with the spirit of Bill and Ted. It's garbage.”
But those souvenir Bill and Ted figures continue to sell and have been joined this summer by Face the Music T-shirts and socks. Corporate sponsorships have flocked to the new movie, with Cheetos and San Diego's Comic-Con receiving prominent attention onscreen.
How does Reeves feel about this latest merchandising blitz? He can always respond with one of his impenetrable answers. “In my art,” he once said, “I'm making up for what I do in life. That's my penance.”