The John Wick franchise became more than just a saga following Keanu Reeves’ title assassin when it delivered the Peacock subscription-exclusive prequel series The Continental in 2023. Now we’re about to enter spinoff territory again with the 2025 movie release of Ballerina, which stars Ana de Armas in the lead role. This time though, Reeves gets to partake in this side quest as John Wick, although this didn’t mark the first time he and de Armas met. A decade ago, the former showed the latter choreography from the first John Wick movie.
Ana de Armas, who has previous action experience from No Time to Die, The Gray Man and Ghosted, reflected on that experience while appearing on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. She and Keanu Reeves first worked together on Knock Knock, and after they made each other’s acquaintance, he showed off some of the moves he’d done for John Wick, which hadn’t been released yet. In de Armas’ words:
The first time we met, we were at lunch, and he told us the story about John Wick. Like, he had just wrapped the first John Wick...He got up from the chair in the middle of the restaurant and started doing one of the choreos in front of everybody. I was like 'Well, he looks excited.'
As well he should have been! While Keanu Reeves had no idea at the time that John Wick would spawn a popular franchise, the action choreography alone was enough to make it stand out from the crowd. So Ana de Armas and everyone else in that restaurant got a special tease for what was to come, and man, I wish I could’ve been there. When John Wick was released in October 2014, it was met with positive critical reception and made $86 million worldwide, somewhere around three-four times its budget. Chapter 2 was greenlit a few months later, and the rest is history.
Now the time has come to spotlight Ana de Armas’ Eve Macarro in Ballerina, as we’ll see her training to exact revenge on the people who killed her father. That will include her clashing with John Wick, and de Armas went on to explain just how much these movies mean to Keanu Reeves, whom she’s now worked with three times (they also co-starred in Exposed):
These kinds of movies, I mean, this is his happy place. This is what he likes to do. He loves rehearsing, he loves martial arts....But so generous too when he goes to set, and he knows you're trying to figure it out. So, he gives you your time, and he just steps back, he's never imposing anything. And then when you're ready, he's like 'I'm coming for you.'
Ballerina takes place between the events of the third and fourth John Wick movies. As such, we’ll find Reeves’ character after he was found by The Bowery King, but before he started carrying out his mission of vengeance against The High Table. Although John Wick: Chapter 5 is in development, if it doesn’t get off the ground it’s entirely possible Ballerina will be the last time we see him playing the character since Chapter 4 ended with him being presumed dead.
But ultimately Ballerina is Ana de Armas’ platform to shine on, and her other co-stars include Anjelica Huston, Ian McShane, the late Lance Reddick, Gabriel Byrne and Norman Reedus, among others. The action flick, which arrives in theaters on June 6, was directed by Len Wiseman and written by Shay Hatten, and John Wick helmer Chad Stahelski oversaw the reshoots, although he’ll go uncredited for that work.
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