“This project came to me right before the Oscars. It was after the Oscar nominations, but before I won the Oscar,” explains Ke Huy Quan as we chat about Love Hurts in a suite at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills. The romantic action comedy offers the actor his first major leading man role.

“My agent says you need to read the script right away. It’s from 87 North and Universal Studios, so I read it quickly in one sitting and remember thinking, ‘Wow, this is a fun action movie.’ The problem was I couldn’t see myself as Marvin Gable. I thought it was somebody else; it was anybody but me because I couldn’t see it. I told my agent. ‘This is a pass for me because they need to find a better actor. I don’t fit the description.’”

They reached out again after he won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Everything Everywhere All at Once, but Quan passed again.

“They were so persistent because they came back a third time and said, ‘Would you please come in and meet with us? It was at a time when I attended an event with Steven Spielberg, and I told him, ‘Steven, I don’t know what to do next. I’ve never been in a situation where I get to choose, and I’m so worried. How do you follow Everything Everywhere All at Once?’ I certainly didn’t want to disappoint all the fans that were rooting for me. I met with Steven, I told him about this project, and he said, ‘Ke, you should do this. It’s great.’ He encouraged me to take the meeting and take on this role.”

Love Hurts stars Quan as Gable, a successful realtor whose past as a violent hitman comes back to haunt him when his former partner, Rose, played by Ariana DeBose, tells him his brother Knuckles, played by Daniel Wu, is hunting him. Love Hurts lands exclusively in theaters on Friday, February 7, 2025, and is not available to stream.

The Worlds Of ‘The Goonies’ And ‘Love Hurts’ Collide As Ke Huy Quan’s Dream Comes True

Love Hurts premiered at the iconic TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, California. Earlier that same day, Quan had the honor of putting his hands and feet in cement in the landmark’s courtyard.

“I remember when I first got the news,” he recalls. “I had to read it two times actually to believe in myself. The first time I read it, I thought I was being invited to somebody else’s ceremony. When I read it the second time, I go, ‘Wait a minute. They are honoring me with my own hand and foot print,’ so you can imagine how emotional I was. The reason is that 40 years ago when we premiered Temple of Doom, I first witnessed the honor of Steven Spielberg and George Lucas getting their hands and footprints done.”

“I remember thinking, ‘Oh, how special they are to be able to have their hand and foot print permanently cemented in this theater.’ I remember thinking, ‘Would it be great? Do you think one day they would ever ask me?’ That was 40 years ago, and having this honor leaves me speechless. I don’t even know what to say.”

At the hand and footprint ceremony, Quan was joined by his The Goonies co-stars Corey Feldman, Jeff Cohen, Kerri Green, and Josh Brolin. However, Sean Astin, who also stars in Love Hurts and previously co-starred together in Encino Man, was not there. The pair are, however, close in real life, and having him play Gable’s mentor and best friend in the action comedy showing different types of love was a dream come true.

“Sean joined the film much later than I did,” Quan explains. “When I signed, I was super excited to get on the set and do this; the actors’ strike happened, so I had to be patient and wait until it was over, which was five months, and then we started the conversation again about who’s going play Rose. When Ariana DeBose’s name was brought up, I was so excited. When they talked about who would play my brother, I thought Daniel Wu was incredible. When we talked about Cliff, Marvin Gables’ mentor, who could play him? No one but Sean Astin. We haven’t shared the screen together in 40 years, so doing so in this movie was great. You know how everybody wanted a Goonies sequel? It’s a little treat for The Goonies fans.”

Because of their natural love for each other through their decades-long friendship, did that make their bond on screen even more realistic and meaningful?

“That is a great question,” Quan muses. “I think having Sean play Cliff with our history together added another beautiful layer of emotion there. In the script, Marvin Gable is emotional when he receives the certificate from his boss, Cliff, because it represents that what he’s doing is on the right path; it’s the validation he was looking for. Having Sean present it to me when we were doing that scene, having that exchange with him, and all the memories we shared together was not only Marvin Gable getting emotional, but I was emotional on a personal level. All of a sudden, I was a kid again, especially when we shot that scene, Jeff Cohen, aka Chunk, was behind the monitor watching. When we were done, he came on set, and we just had a really nice Goonies reunion.””That is a great question,” Quan muses. “I think having Sean play Cliff with our history together added another beautiful layer of emotion there. In the script, Marvin Gable is emotional when he receives the certificate from his boss, Cliff, because it represents that what he’s doing is on the right path; it’s the validation he was looking for. Having Sean present it to me when we were doing that scene, having that exchange with him, and all the memories we shared together was not only Marvin getting emotional, but I was emotional on a personal level. All of a sudden, I was a kid again, especially when we shot that scene, Jeff Cohen, aka Chunk, was behind the monitor watching. When we were done, he came on set, and we just had a really nice Goonies reunion.”

The original Goonies reuniting for a sequel on the big screen has been discussed since the original film’s 1985 release. Recent reports suggest that it could finally be happening.

“It’s interesting because every few years, without fail, there would always be a Goonies rumor,” Quan confirms. “I’ve always said, I love that movie. I love the character Data, and if there is a Goonies sequel, I would be the first one there. I would love to revisit that and go on another adventure with my fellow Goonies. I don’t know what the status is on that. I really don’t know because we’ve been trying to do one for so many years. It is such a beloved movie, and I hope we can crack the story and have a script that lifts up to the original.”

However, in the meantime, Quan is focused on fulfilling his duties as a leading man for the first time in his career. The Loki actor has been getting ready for this day by learning from the best.

“I’ve never been number one on the call sheet, but I’ve worked with a lot of wonderful actors who were and are number one, like Harrison Ford, Tom Hiddleston, and Michelle Yeoh,” he enthuses. “I knew that they, along with the producer and the director, set the tone on a movie set. If they’re nice, everybody’s having a great time, and if they’re in a bad mood, then everybody feels like shit. So, on the very first day, I wanted to make sure that the entire cast and crew, especially the crew, because it doesn’t matter what job it is, I wanted them to feel welcome and part of a big family. Their contribution to this movie is just as important as what I bring. Movie-making is a collaborative process. We’re so lucky to be able to do this, and I’m very passionate about it, and it’s only fun when everybody’s having a good time.”

“I studied martial arts for many years and even got a black belt because I love this genre. I wanted to do it myself. I did a couple of really low-budget independent action movies, but when they came out, nobody saw them, nobody heard about them, and I was so disappointed. I thought, ‘Maybe it’s not meant to be.’ At the same time, I watched movies like The Karate Kid and Steven Seagal’s Above the Law, especially those Hong Kong movies from the early 80s, starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li, and Sammo Hung. I loved it, but I didn’t think I would get to be in a major studio picture doing that myself one day. That was really special.”

Ke Huy Quan Looks To The Future

There is no one Quan would rather have taken his Love Hurts journey with than the team behind the movie, including the ass-kicking action power couple at 87 North, David Leitch and Kelly McCormick.

“When I met with them, they knew so much about how to make these types of action movies,” the actor recalls. “I immediately understood that they were trying to create a different kind of action hero, someone who doesn’t look lethal at all until he becomes very lethal. That really excited me.”

Everyone was committed out of the gate, and Quan, who has spent several years behind the camera as a stunt choreographer and assistant director, knew it had to be done right if they were going to do it at all.

“The first day on set was easy. The second day was when we did the kitchen fight, and oh my gosh,” he laughs. “I thought I was prepared for it, and I was physically and mentally, but there were a lot of challenges during that. The floor was really slippery, and I couldn’t get a footing on set, and it was the first time that all of us had come together. The crew had never made this type of action movie before. They’ve made Nobody; it was the same crew as that and Violent Night, but this is a very different kind of action movie.”

“It was tough because we were having so many problems, and in the beginning, I felt like we were just compromising. We were moving on without getting the best shot we could possibly get, and I knew from the beginning that this was an action movie, and we had to deliver on the action, so I told our director, Jonathan Eusebio, and our second unit director, Can Aydin, ‘Come on. Let’s not compromise. Let’s make this movie the best we can, especially at the fight scene.’”

He continues, “We shot Love Hurts in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and our location manager found this neighborhood that was quite new. Not all the houses were lived in, but some were, including the one we shot in. They were able to find just this neighborhood, which was very fenced. You see all the fences in the gardens so that I can hop from one end to another, and it turned out great. That was the second or third week of production, so that is after we shot the kitchen fight. From that, from that day forward, I was every day I was waking up with pains and bruises.”

With Hollywood classics, a successful second career behind the camera, and a third bite of the cherry with shows like Loki, an Oscar win, and his first leading role under his belt, what does Quan want to tackle next?

“Horror,” he concludes. “I would love to do a good horror movie. I’m not a fan of the supernatural, the haunted genre, because I’m a scaredy-cat. I’d love to play a really good, diabolical killer. I love movies like Halloween, and a recent one that I loved was Heretic. Long Legs is another that I absolutely loved, so those types of things would be amazing.”