He’s racing bikes, breaking hearts, and falling flat on his face. A new clip from Disney’s Toy Story 4 introduces us to Keanu Reeves’ Duke Caboom, a Canadian stuntman with a fabulous cape...and a tragic backstory.
Pixar shared a clip on Twitter, showing every nook and cranny of Duke Caboom’s flexible bod as he regales Woody and Bo Beep with his sad origin story. He was an action figure based on the Canadian version of Evel Knievel, a motorcycle daredevil who could perform even the riskiest of stunts. Alas, the actual toy couldn’t quite live up to the task.
IGN recently shared a set visit from Toy Story 4, where director Josh Cooley talked about bringing Reeves onboard to voice the traumatized stunt toy. He said that Reeves was always the top choice on their list, as he’s both Canadian and a total badass, and Pixar was thrilled when he agreed to play the part. Surprisingly, they didn’t know Reeves is actually a motorcycle aficionado, too—something which ended up being a nice bonus.
During the interview, Cooley recounted the first day Reeves showed up to talk about the role. Apparently, he got really into it:
He came here first to meet with us before even signing. We were down in the atrium and he was like, “You know, what does he sound like?” He completely won me over, to the point where we were talking about the character and he was just getting deeper, and he was like, “What do you think drives him?”
Then he just got up on the table. Imagine just sitting down there eating lunch in front of everybody and he just gets up and goes, “Oh! Ho! Hah!” and he was doing all these poses. I was like, “This is, this is it. This is incredible.” Every time we recorded with him, he had the biggest smile on his face, it was just so much fun.
Toy Story 4 comes out June 21. You can also catch Reeves punishing bad guys for murdering his dog in John Wick 3, out May 21.