Winona Ryder Reveals Why She and Keanu Reeves Call Each Other ‘Husband’ and ‘Wife’ in Texts

Winona Ryder just revealed that she and Keanu Reeves still refer to each other with the nicknames “husband” and “wife” when they text, all thanks to one of the best behind-the-scenes legends of all time. Reeves and Ryder co-starred in Bram Stoker’s Dracula in 1992, and back in 2018 they revealed that their characters’ wedding ceremony was so official, it may technically have been legal. In a new appearance on the Happy Sad Confused podcast this week, Ryder revealed that she and Reeves still joke about their possible marriage every time they talk.

“We always say who it is even though it says it on the text,” Ryder said. “So he’s always like- like, on his birthday, I’ll write ‘Happy birthday, my husband,’ and I put ‘Noni,’ and he’s like, ‘Hey, wife, love you! KR57,’ like on each birthday, he’s like ‘KR57,’ or whatever his age is, and he’s always done that. He’s the best.”

Ryder was the one to reveal that the 1992 Dracula adaptation featured “a real Romanian priest” in the scene where her character Mina Murray married Reeves’ character Jonathan Harker, leading her to believe the marriage might be legally recognized in some places. At the time, she told Entertainment Weekly: “No, I swear to God, I think we’re married in real life… We shot the master and he did the whole thing. So I think we’re married.” Later, she told Esquire that director Francis Ford Coppola agreed with her.

Reeves also spoke about this possible marriage in a 2019 interview on The Talk. He said: “Once in a while, I will get a text: ‘Hello, husband.’ I didn’t really believe her, and then Francis Ford Coppola, the director of Dracula, contacted Winona and said publicly that, yeah, that really happened, the priest did a full ceremony and Winona and I got married.”

Ryder and Reeves are both in long-term relationships with other people – Ryder with Scott Mackinlay Hahn and Reeves with Alexandra Grant. Still, many fans like to hear about the cordial exchanges between this techincally-married duo. In this week’s interview, Ryder was asked if she would work with Reeves again – perhaps on his hit John Wick film franchise. She responded: “If it involved a lot of stunts, I’m, like, thinking of my bones. Oh my God, I would literally do anything with him though. He is so special.”