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If you watch the Ana de Armas-led Ballerina, you will notice a stark contrast in the action sequences compared to the John Wick movies.
Eve (de Armas) is a more vulnerable character than John (Keanu Reeves). Early on in Ballerina, she is told to “fight like a girl” while training in the ways of the Ruska Roma.
The fact of the matter is Eve isn't physically stronger than some of the people she goes up against. However, she uses her wit and her strength to her advantage, whether that means kicking them in their nether regions or something else.
De Armas worked closely with stunt coordinators Stephen Dunlevy and Jackson Spidell. Both of them are veterans of the John Wick franchise at this point, with Spidell previously serving as Keanu Reeves' stunt double, so their partnership with de Armas was crucial for Ballerina to work.
Spidell acknowledged that they “put her through it,” and the more they pushed her, the more motivated de Armas became. She probably enjoyed the times she got to throw them on the ground even more because of their motivational tactics.
“I think it put a smile on her face, just throwing us to the ground,” Spidell joked. “She was a monster, and she was able to harness that little fire inside.”
Despite everything, de Armas always wanted them to “bring it on.” As Dunlevy explained, it's imperative for stunt people to build relationships with actors: “You can't just suddenly drop an actor in and go, ‘You're gonna do this.' You show them choreography, and they're like, ‘Woah, I'm not gonna be able to do this.'”
Luckily, de Armas, by all accounts, picked up the choreography easily. Dunlevy recalled the fight in the ice club that required a “lot” of choreography to remember: “She is able to maintain choreography so well, so that was a plus on our side.”
The sequence he named as the one where they pushed de Armas the most was one involving grenades (and lots of them).
“That was more like [a] cat and mouse deal,” he explained. “It was such a survival moment of her trying to get these people out when she's in this maze that she doesn't know. That was very intense.”
Not making Ana de Armas a “female John Wick” in Ballerina
A key for the stunt coordinators was differentiating Eve from John. Even if it takes place in the John Wick universe, Ballerina set out to tell a different story.
At this point, John is able to run through a building of people in minutes. Spidell joked his body count is “equal to a small country.”
Eve still kicks butt, but every punch means more. De Armas worked closely with Spidell and Dunlevy to ensure Eve had vulnerability.
“We didn't want people to look at her and go, ‘Oh, it's a female John Wick,'” Spidell explained. “They come from the same place, but their backstories are different. We will have similarities — they have throws and this and that, but we wanted her to be vulnerable.”
Something Spidell acknowledged is that she is technically “weaker” than John, but that becomes her strength: “If she's small and they're big, she's fast, and they're slow, and she's able to hide and when they're out in plain sight.”
One “rule” they put in place is that Eve couldn't “punch anyone in the face.” Early in Ballerina, she tries, and it hurts.
“She's learning quickly, she's learning on the fly,” Spidell said.
The reason Eve is learning on the fly is because she left her training, whereas John went through it for years. “It's very reactionary instead of planning ahead,” as Spidell puts it.
But could Eve ever reach the John Wick level of efficiency? Spidell didn't rule it out, but there would “have to be a couple [of movies], and we would make sure that you see the knowledge growing.”
What they did differently from other assassin movies
Dunlevy explained his perspective on the matter. One thing he criticized about other movies with assassins is how they make them — particularly female ones — Terminator-like. In turn, “you don't feel a vulnerability for the character,” as Dunlevy said.
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However, Keanu Reeves is an exception to the rule.
“The great thing about Keanu, there's a vulnerability to John Wick — you feel like he could die while we're going through this thing,” he said. “[Eve] was a very different character. She makes mistakes because she's new and she's younger, and she has to fight differently because she has different limitations.”
Dunlevy, who is 6-foot-3, explained it with his own measurables: “I'm 6-foot-3 and 220 pounds, so I'm gonna fight very differently to someone [smaller]. The guys that I train with that are 5-foot-10, they're faster or lighter, or they have to move around a lot more, whereas I can rely on strength.”
His wife, a purple belt in jujitsu, could take him down to a fight similar to Eve in Ballerina.
“She can control me because she's concentrated on technique, whereas I cheat with strength,” said Dunlevy.
Credit goes to de Armas, who was the driving force behind this character development. She “wanted to see that character development through the entirety of the script so that she had these learning moments, and we felt like we were learning with her.”
Plus, de Armas loved bragging about her battle scars. Dunlevy recalls her showing off her bruises one day on set.
“She was super proud,” he recalled. “When she would get banged up or bruised, it was a moment of like, Yeah, I did that, you know?”
Why do they keep coming back to John Wick?
You'd think after four movies and now a spin-off, Spidell still finds the John Wick series fresh. There are even more layers he thinks they have yet to explore.
“There is so much world-building we can do. You look at the first John Wick, where for the first hour and a half, no one dies, just world-building. And we got to the point now where John Wick kills everyone,” he explained. “I think for the future — I'm just talking for me — I don't know what's planned, but there's so much scope and intrigue within this world — it doesn't have to be about killing; it doesn't have to be about assassins.
“In Ballerina, the Ruska Roma, they're protectors and they're also assassins. There's this whole other world we can expand and go to. It's about being creative and not just going down a single path,” he continued.
Spidell specifically name-dropped the Fast & Furious franchise, which has done everything, including going to space, as something to avoid replicating.
“You don't really want to go down the Fast & Furious road [where it's like,] ‘We've gotta do a bigger car chase.' I think there's more creativity, and we've just touched the surface of that world,” he continued.
Ballerina is in theaters.
