Are We in 'The Matrix' and Is Keanu Reeves Actually Immortal? A Popular Internet Theory, Investigated
Is Keanu Reeves immortal? One conspiracy theory has suggests that Keanu is immortal or that he's a time traveler.
Published Sept. 4 2024, 4:00 a.m. ET
As far as conspiracy theories go, the one that Keanu Reeves may be immortal is one of the strangest … and the most believable. Science fiction fans who might know Keanu from his starring role in The Matrix films have found evidence that actor Keanu Reeves is immortal. Allegedly, Keanu was born in 1964, making him 60 years old in 2024. But popular internet theories would have us believe otherwise.
Keanu has been in various films that deal with time travel, science fiction, and the unexplainable, such as Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. These have only fed the narrative that Keanu may never die. But where did the conspiracy theory come from and is there any truth to it?
The conspiracy theory about whether Keanu Reeves is immortal began in 2010 with a Reddit post.
Reddit: where all good internet theories begin. If that’s not its slogan, it should be. Naturally, the idea that Keanu Reeves could be immortal started out with a Reddit post, which then turned into a website: keanuisimmortal.com. “I’m not gonna claim I’m the person that first came up with it, but I’m definitely the person that capitalized and developed it,” the website’s mononymous creator, Davide, told Vulture in 2020.
“The details are really fuzzy. I saw that someone posted the photo of Mounet, the actor, saying, ‘This kind of looks like Keanu Reeves.’ That was on Reddit when Reddit was still kind of a niche website. And then, we all started putting together information and things. That was when the first image, which is at the top of the website, was born. It was a collaborative effort of people tracking down other people who looked like Keanu. But the first ever was Paul Mounet.”
The conspiracy theory posits that because there are so many historical figures who resemble Keanu Reeves, he must either be immortal or a time traveler. The most popular comparisons are with Charlemagne, who looked eerily similar to Keanu, and French actor Paul Mounet. Keanu immortalists suggest that Paul died of mysterious circumstances and that his body was never found. But there is a photo of him in his later years, and he died of heart disease at 74 years old.
Keanu has never confirmed nor denied the validity of the immortality theory.
In classic Keanu fashion, he’s kept the theory alive by keeping the truth ambiguous. When Jimmy Fallon asked him about it in 2017, Keanu commented that the similarities in looks were undeniable. Jimmy and Keanu joked about when they met in their youth, but Keanu never denied that he could be immortal.
One of the other contributing factors to the conspiracy theory is Keanu’s generosity. He once said, “Money is the last thing I think about. I could live on what I have already made for the next few centuries.” Last we heard, people don’t typically need to live for centuries, so naturally when he said this, the immortality conspiracists ran rampant.
But of course, in 2024, Keanu has spoken about mortality and thoughts of dying. His 2024 novel, The Book of Elsewhere, written in collaboration with China Miéville, ironically follows an immortal warrior who wants to die. The character shares some physical similarities with Keanu, so perhaps Keanu is now grappling with reconciling his public persona (immortality theory included) and who he really is.
"I'm 59, so I'm thinking about death all the time," Keanu told the BBC. “That's a good thing. Hopefully, it's not crippling, but hopefully, it's sensitized [us] to an appreciation of the breath we have and the relationships that we have the potential to have."
Would someone immortal think about death? Actually, yes they might, as evidenced in Keanu's novel. So we may never learn the full truth … as long as Keanu outlives us all.
