After more than 30 years the Bill and Ted franchise has come to a seeming conclusion with Face the Music. Keanu Reeves was essentially unknown until Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure came along. Of course, now Keanu is, well, Keanu, one of the biggest stars and most popular celebrities on the big screen. But the actor says he's never had quite the same experience as he had when he auditioned for the role of Ted the first time around.
Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter both appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show to promote the VOD release of Bill and Ted Face the Music and Reeves explained that there were a couple of reasons why the Bill and Ted audition process was so unique. The first was that it was the place where he met Alex Winter, and the two have remained friends ever since auditioning together, something which Reeves says rarely happens...
You might go through an experience and have a wonderful experience but not maintain a friendship. And Alex and I have certainly done that. We met at the audition, the crucible, it’s an audition process that I had never experienced and have never experienced since.
Movie sets are certainly places where people spend a lot of time together. It's understandable that friendships can develop, but at the same time, everybody can be so focused on doing their job that such things certainly aren't guaranteed to happen. It did for Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter, which may be the reason the two ultimately became Bill and Ted.
The "crucible" that Keanu Reeves is referring to is the method by which the audition process attempted to find the perfect combination of Bill and Ted, the other reason this audition was so different. Apparently, there were multiple actors being considered and they were put together in various combinations and in various roles to see how they worked and what would be the best pairing. Reeves continues...
I remember like 10 actors, and everybody kind of playing the roles and changing. You know you play Ted, you play Bill and all of that. Alex and I, I think we had, we both kind of played them straight.
In this case, "straight" probably means they just played Bill and Ted as they were written without adding anything of their own, which other actors certainly could have done to try and stand out. Whether it was that performance or the fact that Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter had a natural chemistry, which can be assumed by the fact that they became friends, the two of them were chosen to play the leads, and the rest is history.
Three decades after it began the story has come to its conclusion. Bill and Ted Face the Music is available now via VOD or in limited theatrical release.
