Why The Continental's Titular Hotel Looks Different Than In The John Wick Films — Plus, Grade The Premiere
The following contains spoilers from Episode 1 of The Continental: From the World of John Wick, now streaming on Peacock.
Peacock's The Continental: From the World of John Wick miniseries and the Keanu Reeves-led film tetralogy have some 40 years and an entire cast separating them, but there is one constant: the titular New York hotel.
But even that iconic flatiron building looks different on the small screen — because legally, it had to.
The John Wick films always shoot New York for New York, with the Cocoa Exchange aka Beaver Building at 1 Wall Street Court "playing" The Continental, the hotel where all manner of mischievous, High Table-approved business is conducted.
Peacock's 1970s-set prequel series, though, filmed in Budapest. And while you might think they'd simply build themselves a replica of The Continental's immortalized-on-film facade... they weren't allowed to.
"We knew we had to build it, because we weren't going to shoot that actual building in New York on Beaver Street," The Continental executive producer Albert Hughes, who also directed Episodes 1 and 3, told TVLine. "But then we ran into this really wonderful kind of 'roadblock' which is they didn't allow us the rights to even emulate the look of the building. The owners were like, 'No, you can't even make it look like our building'" — probably because the TV series wasn't ponying up a location fee, Hughes speculated.
"So, my production designer is like, 'Well, that gives us an opportunity...,'" Hughes recalled. "We're in the '70s and Cormac (played by Mel Gibson) is in charge now, so let's add these fascistic eagles in the front and change the design a bit. And it actually ended up being quite wonderful creative opportunity for us."
The interior of TV's The Continental, meanwhile, was "basically reverse-engineered" to emulate what had been established in the John Wick movies, and filmed at a former British embassy, Hughes said.
Interestingly, any perceptible changes in the hotel's appearance are canon within the film franchise, Hughes noted.
"In the first John Wick film, Keanu says to Charon (the late Lance Reddick) when he checks in, 'When did the old place get a facelift?' and Charon says, 'Yes, we remodeled since you've last been here' — or something like that."
What did you think about The Continental series premiere, in which a young Winston Scott (played by The Flight Attendant's Colin Woodell) was determined to track down his brother Frankie before hotel boss Cormac could do him harm — only to see his kin get gunned down in the final moments, teeing up a loaded-for-bear revenge campaign?