Interesting Facts About Ballerina

The final screen appearance of Lance Reddick prior to his untimely death.

The film's events unfold chronologically between John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum (2019) and John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023).

Reunites Keanu Reeves with Ana de Armas, following their collaborations on Knock Knock (2015) and Exposed (2016).

In October 2019 Len Wiseman was appointed to direct Ballerina. Lady Gaga was widely rumoured to be attached to star, and by May 2020 Chloë Grace Moretz was said to be one of the studio’s options for the lead. In October 2021 Ana de Armas entered negotiations to star, and in April 2022 it was officially confirmed that she would lead the film. Principal photography had been slated to begin in summer 2022, but actually commenced in November. The picture had moved into post-production by February 2023, and in March producer Erica Lee revealed they already had plans for a sequel. By April 2023 composers Marco Beltrami and Anna Drubich were working on the score, with the film originally pencilled in for a summer 2024 release. In interviews in September 2023 Wiseman said he had completed his director’s cut.

However, around October 2023 the first insider whispers emerged that the production was a “mess”. In February 2024 it was formally announced that the release would be delayed from its original June 2024 date to June 2025 — a full year later — coming eight years after the script was written and about two and a half years after principal photography. The initial explanation was that extra action sequences would be added, with Wiseman collaborating with producer Chad Stahelski on new material. A few days later Ian McShane stated in an interview that the film was actually undergoing far more extensive reshoots than had been suggested, citing an underwhelming first cut and saying Stahelski and others wanted to “make it better” and “protect the franchise.” In March 2024 a couple of new characters, portrayed by David Castañeda and Sharon Duncan-Brewster, were introduced during the reshoots. In June 2024 Norman Reedus told Collider he had shot additional fight scenes during the reshoots, travelling from Japan to Budapest — where the reshoots were taking place — and then back to Japan.

In July 2024 reports leaked about a test screening of an earlier cut, fuelling claims that Wiseman’s director’s cut had not met expectations. The screening was described as “catastrophic” and there were warnings it might be a “franchise killer.” Leaked responses from test audiences characterised the film as a “borderline imitation of the John Wick movies, but messier and told from a female assassin perspective,” and criticised it as “tonally inconsistent” and “poorly directed.”

When the film’s first official trailer arrived in September 2024, Tyler Bates and Joel J. Richard — who had scored all four John Wick films — were hired to create an entirely new score after the reshoots and re-edits; Beltrami and Drubich’s music from Wiseman’s director’s cut was reportedly rejected.

In October 2024 The Wrap corroborated leaks suggesting Stahelski had been largely “ghost directing” the project during the reshoots rather than assisting Wiseman, as earlier reports had implied. Multiple sources indicated Wiseman was not even brought back to set while the Prague reshoots were filmed, and that Stahelski himself directed the reshoots, which ran for three months. Those events allegedly disrupted Stahelski’s Highlander reboot starring Henry Cavill, delaying that production by around five months — reportedly freeing Cavill to accept a role in Voltron for Amazon MGM. Lionsgate denied these accounts, asserting Wiseman stepped away temporarily due to a “serious health issue” and later returned to work with Stahelski on what the studio described as a one-month period of reshoots, despite other reports that actors were involved in reshoots between March and June 2024.

Also in October 2024 the film underwent another test screening, and audience scores and reactions to the new cut after Stahelski’s reshoots were said to have “skyrocketed significantly,” receiving a far more favourable response compared with Wiseman’s version.

In November 2024 Wiseman told Empire that the production had not experienced reshoots, only “additional photography” intended to reinstate scenes that had been cut from the script due to “budget constraints.” He did not address earlier, widely reported accounts that the film had endured three months of reshoots directed by Stahelski, which allegedly included new cast members, the replacement of the original score and substantial changes rather than merely the insertion of extra scenes.

In a January 2025 interview with Collider, de Armas and McShane said their characters had shared a fight sequence set in the Continental during which she attempts to extract information from him and only stops once she realises he is on her side — a scene that was ultimately removed, most likely during the reshoots and re-edits. McShane said he was “furious” that the fight was cut.

The film was originally scheduled for release on 7 June 2024. To allow the filming of further action sequences, its release was rescheduled for 6 June 2025.

Lady Gaga was under consideration for the leading part of Eve Maccaro in the film before Ana de Armas was cast.

Shay Hatten penned the original draft of the screenplay as a self-contained feature film.

According to the Wrap, Chad Stahelski re-shot most of the film after being dissatisfied with Len Wiseman's original cut. The reshoots were carried out in Prague over two to three months, without Wiseman's involvement. One insider said, "Of course Chad had to tidy up someone else's mess. Remember, this film is essentially 'John Wick 3.5.' The story takes place before 'John Wick 4' and, after that film, they can't risk a failure in anything 'Wick' related."

Brings together once more Gabriel Byrne and Anne Parillaud, following their work on The Man in the Iron Mask (1998).

Prior to the casting of Ana de Armas, American ballet dancer and actress Unity Phelan made a cameo appearance as the ballerina Eve Macarro in John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum (2019).

Some of the action set-pieces and other sequences from Shay Hatten's original 2017 spec script, written before it became linked to the John Wick universe, which were subsequently altered or removed during rewrites by Hatten, Len Wiseman, Michael Finch, Emerald Fennell, Rebecca Angelo and Lauren Schuker Blum, include: a shower scene featuring Rooney (portrayed by Eve Macarro in the film) that escalates into a fully nude fight when she is assaulted while showering; Rooney being pursued through woodland by dozens of assassins before she turns the tables and begins to hunt and kill them; a massive shoot‑out between Rooney and assassins in a bowling alley while "Your Love" by The Outfield plays in the background; Rooney behind the wheel of a fully armoured 1978 Plymouth Fury, using its built‑in weapons to demolish buildings and whole streets of a town packed with assassins; Rooney entering a retirement home for elderly assassins and engaging in a huge brawl and shoot‑out with the residents while "Barbara Ann" by the Beach Boys plays, before she obliterates the entire establishment and everyone inside with rockets; and Rooney triggering a cliff collapse to bury a convoy of assassins as they pass, sending them tumbling under the falling rock.

Shay Hatten's original spec script, written in 2017 when it was intended as a standalone action picture rather than part of the John Wick universe, was conceived as a deliberately tongue-in-cheek, over-the-top, old‑school action film with abundant dark humour and a near self-aware tone — even featuring an on‑screen body count for Rooney Brown (renamed Eve Macarro in the finished film) that would appear after each action set‑piece — and it was described as containing a great deal of graphic, very bloody violence and gratuitous nudity by Rooney. From 2019 to 2022 the screenplay underwent multiple rewrites to mould it closer to the John Wick films after the decision was made to turn it into a spin‑off. Hatten initially rewrote the script with Len Wiseman, then worked on further drafts with Michael Finch; Ana de Armas also brought in Emerald Fennell — who had just won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Promising Young Woman — to undertake another rewrite. The Writers Guild of America page for Ballerina additionally lists Rebecca Angelo and Lauren Schuker Blum as contributors. Of the six writers involved, only Hatten receives a screen credit on the final film.

Chad Stahelski stepped in as director and re-shot substantial portions of the film because he was dissatisfied with the direction Ballerina was taking.

In John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum, the tattoo on the ballerina's back, played by Unity Phelan, reads "Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum", which translates as "If you want peace, prepare for war" and is seen when John returns to the Ruska Roma. In Ballerina, however, Eve's back tattoo, portrayed by Ana de Armas, is changed to "Lux In Tenebris", meaning "Light in Darkness".