Comedian Had to Overcome His Awe of Keanu Reeves Before Shooting Film Together

Everyone has that person who makes you speechless. Maybe they are the reason you got into your chosen career, or maybe there’s just something about them that makes it seem like they’re larger than life. For comedian, actor, and filmmaker Aziz Ansari, that person is Keanu Reeves.

Ansari Had to Hang Out With Keanu Reeves to Stop Being ‘Freaked Out’

When Ansari and Seth Rogen began coming up with actors to play the angel Gabriel for their body-swap comedy Good Fortune, Reeves’ name came up. But for Ansari, getting the actor to agree to the role seemed too good to be true.

“Keanu’s one of these guys who’s in pretty rarefied air,” Ansari told Entertainment Weekly. “You don’t see him around. He’s still pretty mysterious. He’s one of the few guys who still has this real movie star aura.”

When the John Wick star agreed to play the character, Ansari was shocked. “I couldn’t believe it. It just turned the movie into something else, and I was so excited. I’m still excited,” he said. But now, Ansari had to find a way to look at Reeves as just another guy, and not a God-like legend.

“I was like, ‘Hey man, we got to hang out a few times, so I’m not freaked out being around you. You know what I mean?’ So he was like, ‘I get what you mean,’” Ansari said. “So, we hung out, and he came over to my house. I made him Indian food, and we hung out for a while, and he told me all these stories. And then we went to dinner a couple of times, and I tried to really spend time with him to get to know him a little bit so I could become comfortable around him.”

Luckily, it worked. “He very much believed in the story and my idea for how to tell it. We had a great time. It was really fun,” Ansari remarked.

Keanu Reeves Broke His Kneecap While Shooting the Movie

Unfortunately, an accident during filming resulted in an unexpected injury. “He tripped over a rug or something, and it’s the last thing he expected,” Ansari remembered. “We have his stunt man, the same stunt guy that worked with him on all those [action] movies, The Matrix, and everything. I was like, ‘Oh, he must’ve gotten hurt on those movies.’ He was like, ‘No, never got hurt.’ I was like, ‘Oh God.’”

Despite a broken kneecap, Reeves was determined to keep filming. He even tried to film a salsa dancing scene, but luckily, Ansari and the crew convinced him to wait until his knee had healed.

“I didn’t even think about this until recently, when I was like, ‘Oh my God, he really hurt his knee. He could have been like, ‘Hey, I’m out, man. I’m sorry. I have a pretty serious knee injury. I’m so sorry.’ But he never complained,” Ansari recalled. “He just did the whole movie, and I can’t thank him enough. And he did such a wonderful job, and he really steals the movie.”

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