Keanu Reeves spilled how the start of his acting career came with a surprising request to change his name.
On October 15, the 61-year-old actor appeared on the New Heights podcast with Jason and Travis Kelce and looked back on his early days in Hollywood when he moved from Canada to Los Angeles.
“I was in Toronto, Canada, and then I got a manager who lived in Los Angeles,” Reeves said. “At 20 years old, I drove in my car to Los Angeles. Got out of my car and my manager said, ‘We want to change your name.’”
The Good Fortune star described that moment as his “welcome to Hollywood moment,” noting it left him questioning his identity.
“I remember I was on the beach, walking on the beach just like, ‘My name? What if I change my name?'” he recalled.
Jason asked if his team had a name in their pocket, Reeves replied “No.”
Instead he had to brainstorm his own name and he came up with own options.
“My middle name is Charles, so I was like, ‘Chuck?’ And I grew up on a street called Spadina, so Chuck Spadina.” Reeves shared.
Eventually, he and his team agreed on “K. C. Reeves.”
However, Reeves admitted he “couldn’t do it.”
“I would be in auditions and they would go, ‘K. C. Reeves?’ And I wouldn’t even answer,” he shared, adding six months later he abandoned the new name.
For the unversed, Reeves moniker “K. C. Reeves” appeared in a 1986 episode of The Magical World of Disney.
