Cast Interview Good Fortune New York Premiere

Good Fortune New York Premiere Keanu Reeves

I'm, uh, I play an angel, Gabriel, and I'm just trying to, uh, he wants to save a lost soul, he wants to do more. And, um, so he's doing his best, trying to help people. I was just fun. I mean, I was working with masters, with Aziz and Seth and Kiki Palmer is amazing, and Sandra Oh is fantastic. 

So, I was just really in great company and we had a wonderful script to work to work with, and Aziz is a great director. Well, I mean, Aziz kind of looks good, and I think the idea of being able to laugh together is great. You know, the theatrical experience of being in the same place at the same time, focused on something, I think that shared experience is... feels good and is important. Lovely.

Good Fortune New York Premiere Sandra Oh

Uh, Aziz's script, uh, the cast, and the opportunity, honestly, to play an angel. I thought it was gonna be fun. I thought it was gonna be fun. You know, to be able, enjoy scenes with Keanu, but really, it was, it was Aziz's and his script. I think it always has to do with what is the story? What is the script? What are you wanting to say? And I think, you know, uh, hopefully this film will land just right for a lot of people. It's a fun film, you'll have a nice time, you know. Um, and you'll enjoy yourself. Yeah. Martha is really essential to Gabriel's entire. 

She's pushing him off into his storyline because he wants something that I think many, many human beings want is I want more. I want more purpose, I want more meaning, and I wanna be able to help more. And the way that she just kind of pushes him off and also, you know, tries to help him understand that there are, um, it's not rules, but it's like, you do have a job as an angel, and you need to kind of the way that she writes him is also very important for his storyline. 

She's his senior and like, you know, is, is, is trying to, trying to put him on the right track. It can be timely, but it's always, you know what I mean, in some ways it's like, I, you know, it's universal, it's like there's a lot of films and television shows that are about class, that are set, uh, like 200 years ago, 300 years ago, 400 years ago, and it's very much of a class that we can't really, really, uh, get right really right into because it's not the person who's actually delivering our food, right, or helping us out there, or you know what I mean, it's, it, it, it's removed because people are in costumes and you can't really get into it. 

That's why I like, you know, this, obviously, the setting is very, very now. There's a lot of people who are doing gig work, and there are, the disparity between, you know, those, uh, I don't want to call them the 1%, the 0.5%, and, uh, the 99.9% is very, very, very high. And I think to be able to enter into that conversation as many different ways as possible, um, is a good thing. 

Oh, because communion, you know, communion, it's like, there's so many ways that we're all separated right now, but I hope people remember, it's like when you come into a room with a bunch of people, just like with theatre, um, it, it, you get a different sensation that you just cannot get anywhere else, and to laugh with a bunch of people is a special, it's a special, it's a special feeling.

Good Fortune New York Premiere Seth Rogen

So I thought the script was great. I thought the story was something I thought was very timely, and um, and I had been talking to Aziz about it for years by the time we made it, like when he first thought of the idea. It's something I mean, it was based on a similar idea I think he pitched me literally like 15 years ago or something like that. So it's something that's been kicking around for a long time. 

Yeah. Uh, my character is got a name Jeff, who's a very rich man, as our world has many of these days. Um, and he's sort of like oblivious to the world's problems in a lot of ways, has sort of bought his way out of the common struggles that people face on a day-to-day basis. Um, and he has his life switched with Arch, someone who um, is very in tune with the day-to-day struggles that people face, and all of a sudden, yeah, my guy goes from being like a very rich, comfortable guy to a very not rich, uh, guy who has to really find out how hard today's world is to just make a living, you know? I mean, the cast is so good. 

I mean, I've been I mean, Aziz obviously a very funny guy, someone I worked with many times over the years. And Keanu, you know, is probably the star of one of the first comedies I was ever truly a fan of in the form of Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, which I think came out when I was like seven or eight years old, and was honestly one of my first favorite movies, you know. Um, and so, and Parenthood is a movie I always really loved, um, and in our writing, a movie we would reference a lot, you know. Um, and so, he's someone I've always thought was unbelievably funny, and and The Matrix and the John Wick movies, I mean, he makes some of the best movies out there, I think. Also, Kiki Palmer's hilarious. She's so funny. Known her for a while. She's just a hysterical human being, and a pleasure to work with. 

Um, I'd say it's about, uh, what money does in relation to one's happiness, and what no money can do in relation to one's happiness. Yeah. I mean, I think to me, just like, if a movie is really funny, then it, then it's earned its way into a theater, and I think there's no better way to watch comedy than in a room full of other people. Um, and for me, some of my like greatest memories in theaters have been like in comedies that are really funny. And so, I think the movie's actually funny, so I think it, it, it for sure is something that is better to see in a room full of people. 

Yeah. I mean, honestly, I remember turning to Aziz while we were making the movie and was like, "If this makes people who can afford it tip their Uber driver or their DoorDasher just a little bit more, or maybe a lot more, then, then that would be good." I was already a pretty good tipper. I started tipping even more after this movie.