Nearly everyone knows the name John Wick, and now, audiences will get to take a deep dive into the intimate and messy story about how the now iconic action franchise came into existence. Wick Is Pain is a new documentary that tells the never-before-seen tale about the struggles of Keanu Reeves' first film as the titular assassin and how it all exploded into a larger-than-life IP.
The Direct sat down with John Wick director Chad Stahelski and Wick Is Pain producer Josh Oreck (who also leads the production company, Narrator) to talk about how they pulled this documentary together and reflected on what comes next.
Producer Josh Oreck on How 'Wick Is Pain' Tells the Authentic, Messy Story of the Creation of the Franchise
Recording History Takes Some Planning.
- The Direct: "I've wondered this a few times with various documentaries about like productions and films and all that. I wanted to first talk about the archival process. What is the process like in making sure someone is always recording BTS at random moments, even if it may never see the light of day on these various films?"
Josh Oreck: Really, it comes down to in the beginning of this project ten plus years ago, Chad [Stahelski] and David Leitch, the original directors of the original film, [that] feeling like it was something that felt worth documenting.
And essentially, we got this guy who is an old friend of mine [Matthew Sidle] and an old friend of Chad and David's who worked with us on'The Matrix' to fly to New York and ride in the cars with Chad and David and go to the scouts and go to the Pre-Pro meetings and go to the makeup tests and all that kind of stuff.
And Chad and David were nice to allow us on as you might have seen in the documentary, it wasn't necessarily the most copacetic environment. They had a lot of problems they had to overcome. So that's usually when the archivist tends to be shooed away when problems arise.
But to their credit, the filmmakers let us just stick around and then after that, you know, once they got some momentum, Mathew was invited back on John Wicks 2, 3 and 4, and was there all the way up to the very last day in the desert in Jordan. So, you know, he must have shot a couple 1000 hours over those 10 years.
- The Direct: "I can imagine sifting through all that must have been quite the process. Like, what do I keep? What do I take? You probably could have like, three more documentaries."
Josh Oreck: Yeah, and we did, you know, over the years, we made a lot of stuff to help promote the film. We made a lot of featurettes and HBO specials and DVDs, and John Wick has a really active and vivid life in the home entertainment space. People love to buy Blu-Rays and DVDs at John Wick.
So, we made a lot of stuff with that material, but there was always a ton of stuff that wasn't just about promoting the movie, that was about the real life experience of making the movie.
And I, every time that Chad would come back to the drawing board and make another 'John Wick,' I would say, hey, you know, we have a lot of stuff that we've shot that has never seen in the light of day that isn't necessarily all about the victory of 'John Wick,' but that is a little bit more about the struggle of making it. And that's what went into this film.
- The Direct: "One thing that shocked me was just getting to see that genuine, kind of messy conflict on set. And it's usually something that, it does happen on various projects, but it's usually swept under the rug because it needs to be, as a film is coming out and we're getting it out to the world. Overall, how does the review process work for stuff like that? Does every personal conversation need to be okayed that you guys show? How does the ethics behind that and what you're showing work out?"
Josh Oreck: I mean, these guys gave me carte blanche. I don't think Chad censored a single thing in the cut. I don't think Keanu Reeves censored a single thing in the cut, and I don't think David Leitch censored a single thing in the cut. So from my perspective, we got to put what we wanted to into that edit.
John Wick Director Chad Stahelski Breaks Down His Relationship With David Leitch
"We're Just From a World Where Debate and Confrontation Is Not a Bad Thing..."
The first John Wick was co-directed by Chad Stahelski and David Leitch. While the two were longtime friends and work partners, their time on that film was anything but a cakewalk—in fact, the duo were consistently fighting.
- The Direct: "I want to dive deeper into that conflict, just the relationship, Chad, between you and David [Leitch], as it was so important to the first film and the documentary. Can you just talk more about how, like those unexpected conflicts, how [they] helped bring the product that we did get with the first 'John Wick'?"
Chad Stahelski: Now, in my circle, guys, first of all, we're some performers. Well, Dave and I were back in the martial art day, so we're competitors. Different weight classes, but we competed a lot. So I just want you to understand that, like you have a competitive mindset. Some things work for you that don't work for other people. See, you come up in that insular way, but you're still part of the team.
"Dave and I were always very different competitors, but part of the same team," Stahelski explained:
Chad Stahelski: Dave and I were always very different competitors, but part of the same team. So now we were both stunt people, which is to say the least, a competitive, ego-driven industry. We were exposed to anything. We formed at a higher level than that. We got to a fairly decent career in our stunt careers, and our action director and our second unit careers. But we all came up in different paths. So, you have a personality, I have a personality, and we both think we're right most of the time.
The filmmaker pointedly noted that they "expected to argue," despite knowing each other for "15 years before that:"
Chad Stahelski: Dave and I… We expected to argue. We expected confrontation. We expected antagonism. Now we, knew each other for 15 years before that. We ran a company together. We did some of the biggest action movies of the time together. It wasn't like, you know, you think we were all in sync, or did you think that one of us is going to have the crown and everybody—No, the reason we did it is because we expected that...
Like, there was nothing surprising. Of course we're gonna bump heads, but the one thing, the goal, was to create something different, right? To go back to a different style was actually to create something different. Like, did we? Yeah.
"We're just from a world where debate and confrontation is not a bad thing," Stahelski elaborated:
Chad Stahelski: We're just from a world where debate and confrontation is not a bad thing. We should argue. There isn't an argument that you'll see, or that we had, we had some pretty, you know, fuck you down to like this is fucking bullshit. There's one time we didn't go home at night, and had a drink. Like, you know, we may be argumentative and egotistical and sometimes delusional, and we argue about the creative process, about what is what isn't. The hardest part was getting in line.
After the original John Wick film succeeded, Stahelski directed the next three installments, while David Leitch focused on Atomic Blonde and various other projects after that. Despite how that might look bad from the outside, those career directions were not a result of any conflict from the set, but rather the organic way forward for them both:
Chad Stahelski: So when the movie did well, it gave us both the financial and occupational freedom to pursue our own different interests. That's why we kind of went our own ways, because we each had our own things. But, like, we still talk all the time, and there is never an argument that disrupted a friendship.
I mean, It's hard when you see people, you think, Oh, my, like, look, we have huge egos, but we're not idiots… I think our strength is the ability to yell, scream, be confrontational, debate, and still hold respect and love to get the right juice out of the squeeze...
The director pointed to how Keanu offers his feedback during the process as an excellent example of the benefits of debating and arguing:
Chad Stahelski: Like Keanu will debate all day long, like he'll question us, he'll do things, but that's not going to upset his absolute trust in the director to do the thing he just wants to. We want to own that and hear each other. You never want to enter in a creative environment [where] can't be heard at the end of the day…
Like there's still the director hierarchy and all that. But we want smart people giving ideas, we don't assume we know everything. If you shut that down, if you have some weird hierarchy where you can't debate, you see what that does in politics and relationships and most certainly in a creative process...
Wick Is Pain producer Josh Orbeck jumped in to offer his thoughts on Stahelski and Leitch's relationship, and how he's seen them talk about it:
Josh Orbeck: I would just say really quick, as a follow-up, like when we sat down to do the commentary for 'John Wick 1,' the DVD commentary, and it was just you, David, and some alcoholic help, it. You guys were absolutely giddy with excitement to call out each other's ideas. You guys were like, That was your idea. That was fucking awesome. That was your idea. That was fucking awesome. So after all the argument, the correct idea always won.
Stahelski: Yeah. I mean, we come from a very you know, you can't really bullshit behind the camera, either good or you're not. You come through, you don't. You hit your mark [or] you don't. Some people have a very unique way of dealing with like, there's no bullshit.
There are egos and also, but at the end of the day, you kind of know the truth, because you actually have to deliver. There's no fantasy about it. So, you have to be honest with yourself, too.
And, you know, basically, that shit talking that, calling each other out and given like—We came up very early, realizing you can still maybe talk a little shit, have little fun with somebody, take the piss out of them, but still hold the great amounts of respect for them. That's what it's kind of about, and that's just kind of the little bit of the, I guess, the inner workings of the background we came from.
On Deciding How Much Time Each John Wick Installment Would Get in the Documentary
There's an Insane Amount of Footage Documenting the Creation of These Films
- The Direct: "On a structural level, for this documentary, how did you guys decide how much time you knew each film would take up in this documentary? Because, as I mentioned earlier, there's enough content for at least one per film. So like, how did you decide the structure?"
Josh Oreck: We debated it a lot... There's so much drama in the creation of the first film, and to some extent, two, three, and four. Like, there's a bit of the rest is history to the way the storytelling could go.
But of course, having the [witnessed] three and four, there's so much, first of all, just so much insane filmmaking to be shown, and so much growth, both of the story and of the you know, Chad as a filmmaker and of this world of John Wick, so we wanted to give as much time to every movie as possible. Of course, I think we started out wanting to make a 90-minute film, and like Chad, we swelled up to something over two hours, and tried to have it back into something manageable.
But it's hard, because there's a great human drama in just the first movie even getting made at all, and in the life that everyone made, Derek, Chad, David, everyone led up to the point of the first movie getting made. And there's a lot of that. There are a lot of these guys coming out and getting their feet underneath them in the film industry and doing stunts, and Derek coming up with the idea.
So, 'John Wick 1' takes up a great deal of real estate, but that's not to sell the process of making these other three films short, because they went from a little indie movie shooting in New York to a complete bonkers, epic movie where Chad literally rented the Louve and was shooting in front of the Mona Lisa. So I feel like there's a good story to tell all around.
The full video interview can be seen below:
Wick Is Pain is available to purchase on digital platforms.
