Keanu Reeves Bought an Ice Cream He Didn't Eat Just to Autograph the Receipt for a Young Fan
A fan encounter with Keanu Reeves led to one of the sweetest stories ever.
In a series of tweets on Friday, SBNation writer James Dator recalled an experience he had with the actor — a story that the Internet quickly jumped on as proof that “Keanu is the best human alive.”
All went down back in 2001 at a movie theater in Sydney, Australia, Dator explained. Reeves was in town working on the Matrix series at the the time, and had apparently stopped into the movie theater on a Wednesday morning to see From Hell, the Johnny Depp film.
Working at the box office was a “bored as hell” 16-year-old Dator. “…Suddenly this dude walks up in jeans, a leather jacket and a horse riding helmet. A full ass, weird equestrian looking helmet. It takes me a solid 30 seconds to ignore the helmet and realize it’s Keanu Reeves,” Dator recalled.
Dator was instantly “star struck” and wanted Reeves’ John Hancock. So he came up with a quick scheme to get it.
“I do what any sensible 16-year-old does and tell him I’d like to give him my employee discount. This means he needs to sign my sheet and therefore I have his autograph,” Dator said.
Sadly, Reeves wasn’t biting. “‘I don’t work here,’ ” Keanu says, seemingly confused by my offer,” Dator remembered.
Flustered, Dator charged Reeves the normal price and kicked himself “for not getting his autograph.”
Luckily, Reeves saved the day. “Two minutes later there’s a knock on the door behind me that leads into the box office,” Dator said. “I assume it’s my manager. It’s Keanu. ‘I realized you probably wanted my autograph,’ he says. ‘So I signed this.’ He hands me a receipt from the concessions stand that he signed on the back. He then casually throws an ice cream cone in the trash can and sees his movie.”
Only later did it click with Dator: Reeves “bought an ice cream cone he didn’t want, just to get receipt paper so he could scribble his autograph for a 16-year-old idiot.”
2 minutes later there’s a knock on the door behind me that leads into the box office. I assume it’s my manager. It’s Keanu.
— James Dator (@James_Dator) May 17, 2019
I realize later that he bought an ice cream cone he didn’t want, just to get receipt paper so he could scribble his autograph for a 16-year-old idiot.
— James Dator (@James_Dator) May 17, 2019
Of course, fans were trilled with Dator’s story.
“Everything I’ve ever heard about that guy is legit,” a tweeter wrote.
“I’m just going to go ahead and cry about the sweetness of this,” another said.
One joked: “Keanu is a genuinely nice guy — and you literally have the receipts.”
The only downside to it all? Dator doesn’t seem to know where the autographed receipt is nowadays. “Honestly, it’s either somewhere in the attic of my mom’s house or lost in the move,” he lamented.
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Reeves, 54, is currently back on screen in John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum.
He’ll next begin working on third installment of the Bill and Ted franchise alongside Alex Winter, whom he starred with in 1989’s Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and its 1991 sequel Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey.
The long-awaited film will be written by franchise scribes Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon and will go into production this summer, with a release date scheduled for Aug. 21, 2020, according to the The New York Times.
“We want to say thank you to the fans,” Reeves said alongside Winter, 53, in a video shot from the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles.
“It’s all because of you guys,” added Winter. “We owe you a huge debt of gratitude so we wanted to say thank you.”
