John Wick Producer Reveals Wild Demand Foreign Distributors Had for Keanu Reeves

Nothing can stop John Wick on the big screen, but there were plenty of obstacles — great and small — that almost stopped the John Wick movies from getting there in the first place. These are laid out in a new documentary called Wick is Pain, which hit PVOD streaming services this weekend. In an interview with ComicBook ahead of the premiere, producer Josh Oreck gave a great example of an issue that took up the production’s time: film distributors in Asia didn’t want John Wick to have a beard. Oreck wrote this off as “dumb minutia,” and there’s plenty more discussed in the documentary itself.

Oreck has worked on the John Wick franchise since 2015, producing many of the shorts and featurettes released alongside the mainline movies. He told ComicBook that in that time, he has gained “immense respect” for directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, saying, “I never met someone who hustles so hard.” He also praised them for keeping that mentality once they achieved their dream of directing a big-budget film.

“Once they had the opportunity, like you can see in this film, they get beaten down on a daily basis by everything from the grand-scale stuff like losing their financing, to just dumb minutia, like there’s this scene in the documentary where they’re getting these notes from Asian distributors that don’t want John Wick to have a beard,” he said. “It seems pretty inconsequential, right? But it is them stopping their day while they’re prepping this movie that’s their livelihood, and everything in their life to that point, in order to send pictures back to some person in some cubicle in some place…”

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“Now, cut to ten years later, imagine John Wick without a beard!” Oreck went on. “Like, just imagine that. And to me, that’s just one of a thousand little fights they had that we just happened to be lucky enough to be in the room for.”

Wick is Pain features interviews with Stahelski, Leitch, Keanu Reeves, and many others that have worked on the John Wick franchise. That includes the financial and logistical issues behind the production, as well as the personal journeys of all those involved. Critics are already praising the movie for its insight into the film process in general, and its celebration of practical stunt work.

Wick is Pain premiered last week at Beyond Fest in Los Angeles, California, and then hit digital stores the following day. It is available now to purchase on Prime Video, Fandango and other PVOD platforms.