[INTERVIEW] Go Ninja, Go! TMNT’s Ernie Reyes Jr. Visits With ILID

Ernie Reyes Jr. will be heading to Dallas Fan Festival next month and we couldn’t wait to get a few words with him! Those that grew up in the 90s can’t help but be familiar with his work onscreen. He helped bring Donatello to life in the first live action Ninja Turtles movie, played the turtles’ pizza delivery sidekick in the sequel, and also starred in other cult classics like Surf Ninjas. Take a look below to get some insight into some of this classic work and don’t miss your chance to speak with him as well when he heads to Dallas Fan Festival on October 4th and 5th!

When you first stepped onto the set of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, did you feel like it was just another movie job, or did you sense it was going to be something bigger?

One of the production companies, Golden Harvest, is a company from Hong Kong, and they were responsible for Bruce Lee, Jet Lee, and Jackie Chan. I had grown up watching all of those movies, and I remembered when their logo came up at the opening of those movies. So for me, as a lifetime martial artist, when I knew that Golden Harvest was the production company in charge, I was automatically, super excited. The first thing I did when I signed onto Team TMNT was fly out to London, to the Jim Henson Creature Shop, and I got a full body cast for the Donatello suit. When I walked through the doors at Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, I knew right then and there that I was a part of something magical. To see all the stuff that he [Jim Henson] had done there and all the creatures from his previous productions… I knew that I was part of something special.

What detail about the TMNT set, costumes, or production still sticks with you today whenever you think about it?

The costumes. First of all, we were shooting in North Carolina in the middle of summer, so you’re talking about 100 degrees outside and 100% humidity. The costumes were probably anywhere between 35 and 45 pounds of foam latex rubber, so it was pretty strenuous. I was doing all of the martial arts and stunts. In a typical 14 hour day, you’re doing fight scenes all day and night in the suit. My body temperature got to about 102 degrees every single day. What I remember from the first movie that it was a lot of hard work, but worth it in the end.

You had done plenty of martial arts prior to filming TMNT. I’ve talked with Ken Scott in the past, and he mentioned how cumbersome the suits were. How much did you have to adjust what you’d previously known about martial arts to be able to perform in the costume?

Your body dimensions are completely different. It was like me being Arnold Schwarzenegger on my 5′ 3 frame. Your whole body mechanics is completely different. Like I said, Bruce Lee was my hero growing up, and I knew I had a chance to work with Golden Harvest and I was hoping that it would lead from one thing to the next, which it eventually did. I was game for whatever challenge was coming my way.

In the second movie, you got to transition out of the suit and into a live action role as Keno. Over the years, fans have kept Keno alive through watching the movie, cosplays, fan arts, and going to conventions like Dallas Fan Festival. What’s the most creative or surprising way that you’ve seen Kino celebrated?

It’s pretty interesting. The kids that grew up watching those movies [TMNT] now have their own kids, who are 9, 10, and 11 years old. So, to see a whole new generation of fans that weren’t even born when those movies came out, for them to be so excited to get a chance to meet me and know about the Keno character and have it be one of their favorites out of the whole TMNT franchises, to me, that’s pretty exciting. To see a 12 year old little boy in his pizza get up cosplaying me from a movie that came out 35 years ago is pretty incredible.

Thirty-five years ago seems like such a long time, but so much has changed with the TMNT franchise since then. For instance, the new turtles use CGI instead of practical suits. Do you think the physicality of the original suits gives the movies something extra that can’t be replicated today?

From my personal opinion, practical effects always give it a different sense of reality, because when you see CGI, you instantly know that it’s CGI. So, I think that part of the charm of those original Ninja Turtles movies was that all the effects were practical… The animatronics, the technology, the Henson group… There was no CGI. It took a team of three or four people to make each turtle work. You had the actor inside the suit, somebody outside that’s controlling all of the facial expressions, and then you have the voice actor. I think that, in comparison to having something computer generation generated, that it’s part of the fun and why it still holds up after all this all this time.

While we are on the topic of your opinion, I have a couple of personal questions for you. Which of the turtles do you feel like your personality best matches? I know you played Donatello, but does he represent your personality the most or is there another turtle that might be more fitting?

No, I think that Donatello represents me. He is the smartest! [laughs]

It’s funny that Keno has withstood the test of time, because he’s really only in the second movie. He’s not in the cartoons, any of the follow up movies, or in the comics. With that being said, in your opinion, in your own head canon, what happened to Keno after the second movie?

Keno was a character created by Golden Harvest. The executive producer from Golden Harvest had brought in four stuntmen from Hong Kong for the first movie. It was the first time that Hong Kong stunt guys were brought to America for an American production. At that time, especially in terms of martial arts, with the likes of Jackie Chan and people like that, the Hong Kong guys were a step above what we were producing in America when it came to martial arts. The stunts were crazier, the fight scenes were a little bit more dynamic. However, one of the guys hurt his back in pre-production, and that’s how I got brought in. So, I was an American kid working with three guys from Hong Kong that spoke no English. When the executive producers met me and got a hold of my personality, they saw that I spoke English and was basically just a California kid. At the end of the first movie, the last day of filming, the executive producer pulled me aside and said, “Hey, you know what? We’re going to create a character for you in the second film so that we can actually see you.” Then, he asked me if I had any nicknames. And I said, “Well, you know, on my mom’s side of the family growing up, everybody called me Kono.” It was literally like, three months later when a script came across my desk asking me to consider the role of Keno. That character was not part of the original TMNT universe; it was something that Golden Harvest specifically created for me. In my mind, Keno is still alive and kicking a**. You know, doing his thing. So, maybe we’ll get to see him in the upcoming live action Last Ronin movie. At least, that’s what my hope is.

That would be awesome. I’ve got high hopes for that movie too. I have one more question for you since Dallas Fan Festival is coming up. You’ve been doing a lot of conventions recently. What do you look forward to most about them?

The thing is, you understand that movies make an impact, because you see the numbers and you see that it [TMNT] was like the number one independent grossing movie of all time when it came out. It’s a hit. But really, when you actually get to meet the people one by one and hear their stories of how these movies impacted them, that’s the most rewarding part about it. There’s a lot of powerful stories that I get to hear about what was going on in their lives at that time, how much it affected them, and how the movies were a bright spot in their childhood. I grew up in film and television, so even prior to the Ninja Turtles, I had been working for almost a decade. I had been in a lot of other things and cult classic movies like The Last Dragon and Red Sonja. So, to be able to meet people that have been following my career for 40 years, and see how much I inspired them, that’s the most rewarding part.

I remember you as Keno, but I actually remember you from Surf Ninjas when I was growing up as well. 

When they were making the third one [TMNT movie], there was a conflict of schedule because I was already filming Surf Ninjas at that time. But, it’s really interesting because people come up to me at these conventions all the time and, of course, they talk about Ninja Turtles, but there are so many that are like, “Dude, Surf Ninjas is my favorite movie of all time!” There’s a really, really, big cult following for Surf Ninjas, even though it wasn’t a big splash at the box office. Then it came out on home video, at Blockbuster, and all those things. New Line even put it out in a in a box set with the Ninja Turtles movie. Even when the Ninja Turtles came out on VHS, the Surf Ninjas trailer played before those movies. It’s pretty surprising to see how many people out there love it.

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