With Ballerina making its long-awaited debut on Digital HD today, we recently caught up with actor David Castañeda (The Umbrella Academy; Poker Face) to talk about his pivotal role as Javier, the father of Eve Macarro (Ana de Armas), who managed to save his daughter from the Cult at an early age and set her on her Ruska Roma path.
We dug into the character work first as David walked me through his conversations with Len Wiseman that shaped Javier’s moral compass, and why this guy is more than a cog in the underworld machine.
We also get into how his training with 87eleven pushed him past his limits, how the choreography evolved on set, and why his big sequence kept nearly every beat they designed. Plus, he also shared on-set overlaps with Ana de Armas, finally meeting John Wick star Keanu Reeves at the premiere, and whether there’s a path to revisit Javier in a potential prequel.
Watch our full chat below and/or keep scrolling to read the full transcription. Plus, remember to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more exclusive content!
ROHAN: To start, what backstory did you and Len build for Javier? There’s a hint of a Romeo & Juliet thread—how did that inform your approach as you drafted the character?
DAVID: Well, my first thought was that this man, Javier, had crossed through some boundaries because of the love he had for Eve's mother, and sort of joined this cult, you know, and eventually started regretting it once he started having a family. So, there is something very much on the opposite spectrum of what Eve's mother became or not became, but was meant to be. And I always felt like Javier, you know, especially with the conversations with Len, it was very much about prohibited love, but at a certain point, you sort of start seeing things differently, as, you know, as a father and a mother. And obviously, in the film, you notice that the sister was able to stay with the mother because she was already old enough to know exactly what she wanted, and the younger one was still kind of naive and still had an appreciation for the unknown and felt a little bit more innocent that the father could still, you know, give her a normal childhood.
ROHAN: You’ve got a killer showcase sequence. I’ve talked to Chad before, so I know how 87eleven works — day one, what did training look like, and how many weeks did you have?
DAVID: The training in itself with 87eleven was quite amazing. I had a full four weeks to train in Budapest and obviously, I wish I would have had more, but four weeks working with people that are at the best in their craft, it was very exciting having the opportunity to learn different ways to approach an art form that I've very much grown up with, which is stunts and choreography, and watching them be so diligent in the details of it all, and they never let me slip up. They always took care of me and all the actors on set, and I felt reinvigorated at times, because when stunts would get too hard, or I would feel a little bit, you know, a little over my head, they always made sure to either adapt to choreo for me to feel comfortable, but more importantly, to kind of push me into doing things that I would have thought I could have never done, and it's no fluke as to why Chad Stahelski and the people at 87eleven have been able to pull off so many of these great films that you see nowadays.
ROHAN: After training wrapped, how long did it actually take to shoot the full sequence — moving from bathroom to hallway to bedroom — and how much rehearsal did that demand?
DAVID: Yeah, I believe it might have been maybe like a week, maybe, that we shot. I mean, my short term memory is really affecting me right now, but I think the actual action sequences took about four days, just the whole fighting, you know, in different spaces, whether it was the bathroom or the living room, or going through the hallway, or, you know, going into the bedroom with young Eve, all of those things. It was quite exhilarating being able to have that much time with a fighting sequence, but also feeling like I don't know if we're going to be able to get everything. And my thought was, there's a good chance that a lot of this fight might be cut out, and it didn't. And to my surprise, and to my excitement, they kept nearly every combination that we had practiced on the day, even though, you know, when we show up on set, usually the fights are always evolving, depending on the space that we're in and the skill level that I would have at that moment.
ROHAN: Did your time as Diego in The Umbrella Academy set you up for Javier’s choreography — or did Ballerina demand something totally new?
DAVID: Yeah, I always feel like the elements of choreo have dated back to previous things i’ve done, to even my childhood when I used to break dance and, you know, when I was 18, my mom put me in salsa classes. So footwork, I think, is a big step in the right direction towards learning fight choreography. And then, you add Umbrella, where they actually had to show me taekwondo, boxing, you know, I got to train Muay Thai. So, then I started putting all these pieces together, and it kind of worked very perfectly, because I don't believe if I didn't have any of that training, four weeks would not have been enough for me to just come in and just do what I did on Ballerina. I would have needed at least, you know, a few months. But thankfully, because of Umbrella, I had almost six years of some sort of stunt training.
ROHAN: Any memorable moments with Ana de Armas or Keanu Reeves — on set or around training?
DAVID: Well, I always feel like I'm a guest walking into a set that big, especially with people that I admire, and so, I'm always just trying to absorb how they work. For example, with Ana, getting to see her train in Budapest, you know, because our training sessions sort of overlapped, so there was moments where we'd be training together and watching how diligent she was and also how welcoming she made the whole place feel for someone like me coming in, you know, midway through the film. And with Keanu, I hadn't met him, you know, during the filming of the movie, I met him actually at the premiere, and that was surreal by itself because I've been watching his films since, you know, since he did Point Break and Speed and The Matrix, and I would say I put that in my top three films. And, you know, getting a chance to stand next to him at the premiere, and just getting a reaffirming head nod as I walked past him, yeah, it was like a small little pinch me moment.
ROHAN: The franchise is expanding. If the right story came along, could you see Javier returning — maybe in a prequel?
DAVID: I would love to. I would be very much open to the possibility of just working with the whole team again, and that is something that I'm still, you know, I'm crossing my fingers that there is some legs behind a great story that can be told as a prequel, but honestly, just the opportunity to have that role in that film for this moment is quite surreal and quite fulfilling.
The next chapter from the World of John Wick follows Eve Macarro (Ana de Armas), who is beginning her training in the assassin traditions of the Ruska Roma. Eve seeks revenge for her father’s death, and finds herself crossing paths with John Wick himself (Keanu Reeves).