Oscars Get Challenged By John Wick Director To Create A New Category And Fans Agree
John Wick Director Chad Stahelski suggests the Oscars need a category for stunts, and Keanu Reeves agrees.
While a John Wick film will likely never win an Academy Award for Best Picture, that doesn’t mean the grotesquely violent action franchise should be excluded from the Oscars entirely. In fact, both John Wick: Chapter 4 director Chad Stahelski and star Keanu Reeves believe the annual awards ceremony is in dire need of a category that honors those who bring the jaw-dropping stunts seen in various genre pictures to the big screen year after year. During a recent interview with IGN, Stahelski said “it would be fair” for stunts to be recognized by the Academy, and Reeves agreed.
In addition to directing every John Wick installment to date, Stahelski has also performed stunts in blockbuster features like Deadpool 2, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, and Rambo. While it’s a job that he believes is worthy of recognition at the Oscars, he said, “As far as I know, the talk has never happened.”
Stahelski went on to explain that a likely reason the stunt people involved in movies like John Wick haven’t received a category honoring them at the Oscars is that not enough people have requested it. He said, “So has any journalist or stunt person ever walked up to the President of the Academy or a member of the Academy and go, ‘Why don’t stunt [get recognized]?” Reeves echoed the director’s statements saying that more people need to come forward with their desire to see the Academy show some love to stunt people.
After inviting the Academy to talk to him personally, Stahelski mentioned that including a category centered on stunts, such as those featured in his John Wick series, would likely make the Oscars a bit more entertaining. Although the annual awards ceremony has maintained a level of consistency for nearly a century, that’s not to say there haven’t been some changes. We’ve seen the addition of new categories, as well as the discontinuation of others over the years.
IGN posted a link to their interview with the John Wick director-actor duo on Twitter, where several users chimed in about the inclusion of stunt people at the Oscars. One user (@bknohunnid) said that in addition to a category that recognizes stunt work in films, a category for motion capture work should exist as well. Another user (@415tule) commented, “Tom Cruise would win every year.”
Fortunately, even if we never see a category that honors the stunt work in films like John Wick at the Oscars, there’s always the Taurus World Stunt Awards. The ceremony, which is held once a year, recognizes stunt performers in motion pictures. The first awards were given out in 2001.
Of course, we don’t need an award show to tell us whether the stunts in genre flicks like John Wick: Chapter 4 are good or not. That’s something we can be the judge of ourselves when the hotly anticipated sequel arrives in theaters March 24. Directed by Chad Stahelski, the film stars Keanu Reeves, Donnie Yen, Bill Skarsgard, Laurence Fishburne, Hiroyuki Sanada, Sahmier Anderson, Lance Reddick, Rina Sawayama, Scott Adkins, Ian McShane, Clancy Brown, and Marko Zaror.
In the upcoming film, legendary assassin John Wick discovers a way to defeat The High Table. Before he can earn his freedom, however, he must face off against a new enemy with powerful alliances around the world and forces that turn old friends into foes.
