Not John Wick or The Matrix: The Angelic Comedy That Gave Keanu Reeves His Worst On-Set Injury
One brutal step, then silence — "I spiked my left knee like BANG!" — and suddenly everything is up in the air.
Keanu Reeves has spent decades getting tossed through walls and dodging bullets in The Matrix and John Wick. So of course his worst on-set injury happened on a comedy where he plays an angel. He told the story on Travis and Jason Kelce's New Heights podcast, and yeah, it's exactly the kind of left-field mishap you think it is.
"My kneecap, I had a vertical break... The pain was banana cakes."
How he actually got hurt
Not a stunt. Not a fight scene. A carpet. Reeves said he was walking back to his dressing room between takes on Good Fortune when his foot caught on a section of laid-down carpeting. He started to fall and drove his left knee straight into the ground, hard enough to crack his patella vertically — basically splitting the kneecap down the middle.
He kept filming anyway
Reeves said he was basically immobilized, strapped into a brace for close to ten weeks, and still kept shooting through it. Not sure if that makes him unstoppable or just stubborn, but it tracks.
What is Good Fortune?
Reeves plays Gabriel, a well-meaning but hilariously underqualified angel who meddles in the lives of two guys on opposite ends of the money ladder: Arj, a struggling gig worker, and Jeff, a wealthy venture capitalist. Gabriel pulls a body-swap to prove that cash isn't everything, promptly loses his wings for doing it, and then has to watch his grand plan fall apart from the sidelines. It is a very 'great idea, terrible execution' kind of celestial intervention.
- Keanu Reeves as Gabriel, the angel
- Aziz Ansari as Arj, the gig worker
- Seth Rogen as Jeff, the VC
- Keke Palmer
- Sandra Oh
- Written and directed by Aziz Ansari
Release date
Good Fortune hits theaters on October 17.