‘THE ONLY REASON TO DO IT’
Keanu Reeves reveals why he decided to step back into the Matrix
Keanu Reeves had one simple reason for agreeing to step back into The Matrix — it has a “wonderful storyline.”
The Canadian actor surprised fans last year when he announced he was returning to the role of Neo, humanity’s saviour, for a fourth time.
“Lana Wachowski wrote a beautiful script and a wonderful story that resonated with me,” Reeves, 55, told Empire
magazine in its upcoming Heroes issue. “That’s the only reason to do it. To work with her again is just amazing.”
Wachowski co-wrote and directed the original Matrix
trilogy with her sister Lilly, which kicked off with 1999’s The Matrix, before continuing with back-to-back 2003 sequels, The Matrix Reloaded
and The Matrix Revolutions.
Worldwide, the films grossed over $1.6 billion at the box office.
The storyline followed Neo and a group of heroes as they battled against futuristic machines that have imprisoned humankind in a lifelike virtual reality simulation.
The fourth movie was currently in production for a May 21, 2021, release date before filming was shuttered due to the coronavirus pandemic. Producers are hoping to begin shooting again in July. Fans have shared some behind-the-scenes images on social media, including a sequence in San Francisco that saw two stunt people jumping off a skyscraper.
Reeves tells Empire that the new entry has been “really special.”
He added, “The story has, I think, some meaningful things to say, and that we can take some nourishment from.”
Carrie-Anne Moss, who played Neo’s love interest, Trinity, in the films, is also returning to the franchise that made her a household name in the late ’90s.
Like Reeves, she too wasn’t ever expecting to reprise her role in the series again.
“When it was brought to me in the way that it was brought to me, with incredible depth and all of the integrity and artistry that you could imagine, I was like, ‘This is a gift,’” Moss said. “It was just very exciting.”
In addition to Reeves and Moss, the film stars Jada Pinkett-Smith, Yahya AbdulMateen II, Neil Patrick Harris and Priyanka Chopra. The plot is super secret, but according to IndieWire, it involves time travel and a younger version of the Morpheus character that was played originally by Laurence Fishburne.
In a 2014 interview with the Sun, Reeves said he would only return to The Matrix if he was pitched an idea that proved to be irresistible.
“Ah ... it would depend on the Wachowskis and it would depend on the script,” he said. But he added that making stuntheavy films was a draw for him.
“I love action movies,” Reeves shared. “I love going to action movies, I love making action movies.”
Reeves nabbed his acting breakout in the 1986 Toronto-shot Youngblood, a hockey movie that starred Rob Lowe and Patrick Swayze. Later that year, he appeared in the dark teen drama River’s Edge. Star-making roles in Dangerous Liaisons, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Point Break followed. But as his career evolved in the ’90s and 2000s, he alternated between big-budgeted action (Speed and
The Matrix) and smaller, more personal fare.
More recently Reeves has found renewed popularity playing hitman John Wick in the films of the same name and voicing Duke Caboom in
Toy Story 4. This summer he returns as Ted Logan in Bill & Ted Face the Music.
“I was most definitely aware of not getting boxed in,” Reeves told the Sun, reflecting on his zigzag career path. “I think it’s on the artist’s mind and the audience’s. There’s this dialogue with fans wanting actors to do certain things and, of course, actors wanting to do different parts as well.
“I was lucky in the past, and I hope it continues, to do all sorts of genres.”