Who Is Rina Sawayama? 5 Things to Know About the Newest ‘John Wick’ Star

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Who Is Rina Sawayama? 5 Things to Know About the Newest 'John Wick' Star

From the stage to the screen! Singer Rina Sawayama will star alongside Keanu Reeves in John Wick: Chapter 4, marking the pop star’s first time working on a major movie set. “My feature film acting debut in John Wick 4 !!!!!! I’m so excited !!!!!” the musician, 30, wrote via Twitter on Thursday, May 27. She also echoed the sentiment on Instagram with a number of crying face emojis. Sawayama’s fans, who have been dubbed “Pixels,” were quick to share their excitement as well. “Rina Sawayama: singer, songwriter, model, living legend AND actress???? no one is doing it like her !!!!!!!” one Twitter user wrote following the casting announcement. “RINA SAWAYAMA ACTRESS ERA? HOLY S—T I'M IN !!!” another added. According to Deadline, the “XS” singer’s exact role is being kept under wraps. Production will begin this summer on location in France, Germany and Japan after previously being delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The film is set to premiere in 2022. “I’m so glad to have Rina on board to make her feature film debut in John Wick: Chapter 4,” director Chad Stahelski said in a statement to Deadline. “She’s an incredible talent who’ll bring so much to the film.” John Wick: Chapter 3 was released in May 2019, five years after the original movie's premiere. The franchise features Reeves, 56, as the titular character, a retired hitman who sets out in the first film to seek vengeance for the death of his dog. [jwplayer tCcvpqs0-l3ahXupL] The pop star, who released her debut album, SAWAYAMA, in April 2020, began her career as a model before joining the music business. Born in Japan, she moved to London at the age of 5 and still resides in the U.K. In a conversation with Vogue on Thursday, Sawayama discussed how she’s seen the representation of minorities change during her time in the industry. “Asian representation was so much lower [when I began my career] and there was a tokenizing of people of colour at the time that I hope is becoming slightly less,” she said. “Before it would be one Asian, one Black person, and then a couple of white people, but it would never tip the other way to be majority Asian or majority Black.” Scroll to learn five things about the boundary-breaking artist before her John Wick debut: [podcast_block]

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She’s Acted Before

Though John Wick: Chapter 4 will be her first film, Sawayama has been featured on a couple of TV shows. According to IMDB, the “Chosen Family” singer had a role in the 2011 show Welcome to the El Palacio. She also appeared in a few episodes of Idris Elba’s 2019 Netflix series, Turn Up Charlie.

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She’s Highly Educated

Sawayama received a degree in politics, psychology and sociology from Cambridge University and later revealed she was enrolled in an online course at Oxford University during a May 2020 LOVE magazine interview.

“I’ve been performing and studying simultaneously for ages and ages now, since I was a teenager, so it wasn't like I finished uni and was like, 'Right, that's the degree done. Now become a singer,’” she said. “It was a gradual process in realizing that ultimately music and being creative was what I wanted to do. I'm super grateful for my time at Cambridge. Although I had s--t times, it definitely taught me about determination and hard work and introduced me to some amazing people.”

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She Funded Her Music Career

According to Deadline, the U.K. native originally funded her music career through her modeling work. She’s been signed to multiple agencies and most recently became the face of Coach’s 2021 pride campaign, telling Vogue that she wants to use her platform to bring light to issues in the queer community.

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She’s Crossed Genres

The musician, who played in a hip-hop group called Lazy Lion in college, is known for her genre-bending sound.

“When I was following bands around as a teenager, it was when indie music was really big in the U.K., like 2006-ish, and I’ve always looked up to rock bands. For each song, I always led with the lyric and then decided which genre would be best to express what the song has to say,” she told Pitchfork in March 2020. “‘Who’s Gonna Save U Now’ only felt right to be a stadium rock song. I wanted it to feel like that moment when Aly steps up on stage with Jackson in A Star Is Born, very visceral. And ‘Dynasty’ felt right for it to be pop-metal, and ‘F--k This World’ felt right to be R&B, and ‘Chosen Family’ felt right to be a bit country.”

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She Has Famous Fans

The newly minted actress has collaborated with Elton John and is set to appear on Lady Gaga’s upcoming Chromatica Remix album.