Experience: Keanu Reeves ‘crashed’ my wedding

One of the bridesmaids was fixing my dress – my husband, James, had accidentally stepped on it as we walked in – when the wedding coordinator came up to me and said, “Oh, you’ve got a special guest outside.” And I thought, “Really? I’ve got family in America. Could some of them have come over as a surprise?”

It was the evening reception and everyone was drinking and dancing. I went outside through the double doors, and there he was, standing looking almost sheepish and shy: Keanu Reeves. My jaw dropped and I said, “Oh my goodness, nice to meet you.” And he said, “Really nice to meet you, too!” So I invited him in, offered him a drink and some food, and we got chatting – I think my five-year-old daughter was trying to climb all over me at the time. He said congratulations on getting married, wished us well and gave me a hug. While we were talking, I turned to the wedding coordinator and said, “Go get James!”

The wedding day, at Fawsley Hall in Northamptonshire, had been perfect. In the morning, there was a beautiful sunrise – it was so peaceful. My bridesmaids came over to get their makeup done and my family pulled together to decorate the reception room. Keanu turning up was the icing on the cake.

What I didn’t know was that it was James’s doing, in a way. An hour or two earlier he had heard that Keanu was staying at the same hotel and eating in the restaurant, so he slipped away from the reception to go and chat to him. He’d explained that we’d just got married, and invited him to come and say hello to me if he wanted – he said I was the one in the big white dress, hard to miss, which made Keanu laugh.

James hadn’t told me any of this, so when Keanu turned up I was as surprised as anyone else. To see him chatting to my friends in the gardens of the beautiful country hotel, where my nan used to love having her afternoon tea, was more than a little bizarre.

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I remember someone shouting, “Is that John Wick?” as more people noticed he was there. But Keanu was relaxed and down to earth – he took time to speak with everyone and did plenty of photos. He wasn’t trying to be the centre of attention, he just seemed happy to be a part of our day. My mum was taking the photos and she shouted, “Everybody say ‘Speed’,” which he found funny. After he’d chatted to everybody, he slipped off and we enjoyed the rest of our party.

The next day we had just arrived in Crete for our honeymoon – really a familymoon, because my daughter came along as well – when someone came up to us in the hotel bar and asked if we were the Keanu Reeves wedding couple, and loaded up an American news website, which had our wedding photos – pictures our guests had posted had gone viral.

It was surreal to have all these people around the world looking at our wedding photo. What’s nice is that it has never felt too much – we haven’t been hounded or anything like that. It’s been really positive. Of course, we get a few things, such as people claiming the photos are fake, or comments saying, “I don’t like her wedding dress.” That made me laugh because I think, well, it wasn’t for you.

We’ve also had a few messages from fans, asking for his contact details and his location, and things like that. We just don’t reply to those. We only met him at our wedding; we don’t have his contact details, he’s not coming round for dinner on a Friday night.

Lots of the stories said he had gatecrashed, which is a bit unfair. Even though it was a surprise for me, James had invited him, so it wasn’t as if he just turned up. It’s been almost a year since we got married and the story keeps popping up every now and then – Keanu even mentioned it on the Jimmy Fallon show recently, which was very funny. All the fuss has been fun, but we don’t think it has changed us. It’s just a really nice reminder of a beautiful day. We went to see the latest John Wick at the cinema when it came out – thought we’d show our support. It was fantastic – tons of action, great storyline. As far as we’re concerned, he’s done it again.

As told to Felix Bazalgette

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