Well how would you feel if we told you that there once was a strong possibility of you never having known Keanu Reeves’ dapper neo-noir hero in all his gory glory?

Last year the billion-minting franchise completed 10 years of enthralling die hard fans. For an interview with Business Insider, co-directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch (and only the latter with an actual direction credit on the film), revealed how let alone the franchise, not even the first film alone would have seen the light of day, had it not been for one angel investor who swooped in at the literal last hour and saved the film from being canned, most probably for good.

“We were less than a week out and we lost almost $6 million on a gap financing. We had all put in everything including Keanu. And we were still short. So we were shut down”, shared Chad. The Creative Artists Agency at the time had offered the film to several actors as an investment opportunity, promising them to be the first returnees upon the film minting profits. And Eva Longoria took it up, though the director-duo didn’t know it was her at the time.

“She came to the rescue and she provided the gap financing. Literally less than 24 hours before we had to lock the doors on the movie and walk away, our producer said, ‘We’ve got the investor, we’ve locked the gap’ “, added Chad.

What convinced Eva? Everything in general but nothing in particular. “I was in my infancy. My bankroll was very new, and it was a lot of money, and I was like, ‘So how does it work?’ I had no idea. I would love to say I was an investment genius and I just knew and I calculated my risk. No, none of that”, she said. She further added that it was Chad and David and their strong backgrounds which drew her towards the project: “I didn’t even know how a movie was made. I was like, ‘What do you mean gap financing?’ But something that I’ve learned, looking back, I love investing in people…I mean, (the directors) did their work. They put in their 10,000 hours as stunt guys and second unit directors, they had seen all the bad movies and knew how to make a good one. It was that. They were undeniably passionate and I knew they were going to make an undeniable product”.

One thing Eva wishes had turned out differently? Her not being attached to all the remaining films!

“What I’m pissed off about is I wasn’t connected to the rest of them. This was a one-time thing. That was the gamble. But that was my only mistake, not being attached to all of the films”, she said.

So if you’re a John Wick fan, you definitely have Eva to thank.