Jeremy Renner visits WIRED to answer his most searched questions from Google. How did his acting career begin? How did he become Hawkeye in the MCU? Is Jeremy Renner a good archer in real life? Is he friends with Elizabeth Olsen? How did Jeremy Renner recover so quickly from his life-threatening accident? Jeremy answers these questions and more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview.
Mayor of Kingstown streams this Sunday exclusively on Paramount+
Director: Justin Wolfson
Director of Photography: Constantine Economides
Editor: Richard Trammell; Louis Lalire
Talent: Jeremy Renner
Producer: Justin Wolfson
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Talent Booker: Katie Pearce
Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache
Sound Mixer: Rebecca O'Neill
Production Assistant: Kalia Simms
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen
Additional Editor: JC Scruggs
Assistant Editor: Fynn Lithgow
Mayor of Kingstown streams this Sunday exclusively on Paramount+
Director: Justin Wolfson
Director of Photography: Constantine Economides
Editor: Richard Trammell; Louis Lalire
Talent: Jeremy Renner
Producer: Justin Wolfson
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Talent Booker: Katie Pearce
Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache
Sound Mixer: Rebecca O'Neill
Production Assistant: Kalia Simms
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen
Additional Editor: JC Scruggs
Assistant Editor: Fynn Lithgow
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TechTranscript
00:00Hi, this is Jeremy Renner, and this is my Wired Autocomplete interview.
00:04Oh, Internet. Oh, Autocomplete.
00:10What do you have more for me on this sheet?
00:16First board. What is Jeremy Renner doing these days?
00:19I'm thriving. I'm getting stronger. I'm happy. I'm healthy and progressing every day.
00:24And thankful. I've had a lot of love and support.
00:28And the reason for my health and me thriving is the support and love from everybody I've got in my life.
00:33And that probably includes a lot of you guys.
00:35Does Jeremy Renner do his own stunts? Yes, I do.
00:39I'm proud that I do my own stunts.
00:41Even in season three of Mary Kingstown, where I didn't think that I retired as a stunt guy,
00:47I was able to kind of pull some stuff off.
00:49And I'm very happy and pretty proud moment this year for me, from January till now,
00:53to get back in the swing of things, if you will. Yeah, yeah. Very proud of that.
00:57What was Jeremy Renner doing when he was injured?
01:02Probably not feeling too good. That's what I was doing. I wasn't breathing too well.
01:08What I was doing, I was clearing my driveway because we had a massive snowstorm.
01:12And I was on a snowcat, which is a big tank-like machine that moves snow around.
01:18I got caught underneath it on the asphalt, and that's what I was doing when I got injured.
01:22We were having a good New Year's Day.
01:24Even the ski resorts were closed that day, ironically, because there was so much snow.
01:27All the ski lifts were buried as well.
01:29How did Jeremy Renner recover so quickly?
01:31Well, recovery is a lifetime. Recovery is pretty lonely, even though you have a lot of love and support.
01:36I got a ton of it, and I have so much gratitude for having all the love and support.
01:40But it still comes down to the individual, and I think anybody that's in recovery knows that
01:44within that loneliness, there's a clarity of direction and understanding of my body
01:49and what can I do best for my body. The body's a miracle.
01:52I think I can be a testament to how great the body can recover.
01:56And then there's also the other things in life, but I think it came from the collective energy
02:02of all the goodness in my life for the people, and even its well-wishes or just thoughts.
02:08If I crossed your mind, even, that's something that I believe got me better much faster.
02:14They told me I wouldn't walk again, or I'd walk funny.
02:16And now I'm running, sprinting, and doing stunts.
02:18So I got the legion of amazing goodwill of you all. Really, I think that's what did it.
02:27Next!
02:28All right.
02:29Is Jeremy Renner good at archery?
02:31Yeah, I suppose.
02:33I think I can make archery look good.
02:35That's something you have to practice a lot, and I haven't done that in probably eight years.
02:39But yeah, it's great, great.
02:41But I can recurve over a compound for sure, those type of things,
02:44which is kind of cool about what my job is.
02:46This guy won two gold medals at archery, and he was the guy that trained me.
02:50So cool.
02:51So you get, like, real quick insights into, like, the shortcuts and cheat codes into archery
02:55or to whatever the skill set is.
02:57And you get to do that for, like, three or four months and spend time on it.
03:00It's really great, and I love it.
03:01It's a great sport.
03:02Is Jeremy Renner Irish?
03:04German-Irish is my main heritage.
03:06Luckily Irish.
03:07Yeah!
03:08Here we go.
03:09Is Jeremy Renner tattoo sleeve real?
03:11No.
03:12Here we go.
03:13See, no sleeves.
03:14That's just for Endgame, wasn't it?
03:16Yeah, Endgame when I had to shave the head and get the sleeves.
03:19That was during the blip, I think.
03:21But it was cool looking.
03:22Is Jeremy Renner left-handed?
03:23Yes, I am.
03:24Left at most things, except cutting scissors, because they don't have left-handed scissors.
03:28And a few other things I have to do right-handed.
03:30Play guitar right-handed.
03:31But everything else I try to do left-handed.
03:33Yeah.
03:36Jeremy Renner.
03:37Why does Jeremy Renner know sign language?
03:39I have a deaf cousin.
03:41But that was when I was a kid, and I lost all that then.
03:44Then when I had a daughter, I wanted to teach her sign language,
03:47because I knew that she'd emotionally grow faster than her verbal skills could.
03:52And it was also just a fun thing to do.
03:53It was like, more cookies, please, Dad.
03:54And I put the things that I taught my daughter into the Hawkeye series.
03:58And in the Hawkeye series, I became partially deaf.
04:02And he had to start to learn sign language.
04:05And he wasn't great at it, but he started to learn.
04:07How are Jeremy Renner and Jennifer Lawrence related?
04:11I asked my dad.
04:12What was he doing?
04:13I don't know.
04:14Are they related?
04:15I think we heard they were like distant cousins or something.
04:17She reminds me of a cousin.
04:18She's very familial to me.
04:19She fits right into my family that way, I think.
04:22She's a great gal.
04:23I love her to death.
04:24Is Jeremy Renner coming back as Hawkeye?
04:26I don't know.
04:27Ask my legs.
04:28Ask Marvel.
04:29Those will determine the ifs and whens if that will ever happen.
04:32I think there's always an option.
04:33I think my body is not going to be limited.
04:35It just comes down to sort of the reason why to come back as Hawkeye.
04:39And is there a real narrative to kind of tell?
04:42We'll see.
04:45Where was Jeremy Renner born and raised?
04:48Modesto, California.
04:49Born 1971.
04:50That was my geographical point of entry, I think.
04:53When did Jeremy Renner film Renovations?
04:55The summer before last, I suppose.
04:58Yeah, because then the accident happened and then the show came out.
05:01Renovations was to send off an idea of taking things that were being wasted by the government.
05:07These government vehicles from fire trucks and city buses.
05:09And in order to get a new fleet, they still have to dump these vehicles.
05:13But the vehicles are perfectly good machines.
05:15So I decided to repurpose them, reimagine them, and give back to kids that are in need.
05:19Like I took a tour bus and turned it into a music studio.
05:23Another one, they lost their dance studio.
05:25This orphanage lost their dance studio.
05:27So then I took this bus, cut a hole in the side of it, made this whole stage flop out.
05:31And this whole proscenium.
05:33And also they get their dance studio back.
05:35So I love it and it's still something I continue to do.
05:37And now I have a foundation.
05:39It's just not limited to vehicles now, but we do help kids and foster kids.
05:42And we're all about it.
05:43When did Jeremy Renner start singing?
05:46As a teenager is when I started.
05:48Started playing drums in a band called Hot Ice.
05:53Oh yeah, I'm sure my neighbors hated us.
05:55I don't know if we ever played out, but it kept us out of trouble.
05:58I always encourage any kid to kind of get into music.
06:00It's so good for your brain and it's also good for your spirit.
06:03I use music as a journal.
06:06You don't see a lot of guys doing journal and diary entries, but music was that for me.
06:10It was cathartic.
06:12It was ways to discover things about myself.
06:15And singing is the expression of that.
06:18Is Jeremy Renner in a band?
06:20I was when I was 13.
06:22We don't know that answer, but right now, no, no.
06:25I did a whole EP about things learned in my recovery.
06:30And to my daughter, I wrote this love song called Wait For Me.
06:34It's the first words I said to her after I saw her after the accident.
06:37And I said, if you just wait for me, all these bones are going to heal.
06:39So each time I would physically get better, I'd see her be less fearful and heal more.
06:44And then music is also, we all know, pretty uniting and healing and emotional.
06:48So there's inspirational songs on it.
06:50There's heartbreaking ones on it.
06:52But it was all cathartic for me to write with my friends too as well.
06:55It was important to share that narrative with them.
06:59Some being my brother-in-law and some very good friends of mine.
07:02So as a solo artist, to put together this collection of songs about the accident,
07:06about the recovery and things learned in it, it's something that's lasting.
07:11And I hope it can help other people as well.
07:16What did Jeremy Renner do before acting?
07:19Wow. I was a good student.
07:22I was a decent son.
07:24I was a writer.
07:27What did I do, man?
07:29I found acting in college.
07:30I went in, I think, as a computer science major or criminology.
07:35I mean, just different things to try to figure it out.
07:37And I found acting.
07:38And then the rest is history.
07:39Just stuck with that.
07:40What was Jeremy Renner's first movie?
07:43National Lampoon Senior Trip was my first film.
07:46It was my first job ever, even on camera.
07:48And I was blessed with the lead role in a National Lampoon movie.
07:52So it was big enough to be the play in my small town.
07:55I was in a role big enough that I didn't have to tell you what role I was.
07:58And it was in a movie.
07:59So I got all three goals that I came down to L.A. to try to achieve in the first job that I ever got.
08:05It took me about maybe a year and a half after being in L.A. and I got that.
08:09So I remember kissing the dirty carpet out in my crappy apartment.
08:12I was so excited.
08:14I'm like, going to Toronto.
08:15I got no idea where Toronto was.
08:17Who is Jeremy Renner in The Mayor of Kingstown?
08:19Why I'm the mayor.
08:20Mike McCluskey in The Mayor of Kingstown.
08:22He's not actually a mayor.
08:24He's more of a power broker.
08:25He's more of a fixer.
08:26He's a friend.
08:27If he's your enemy, it's not good for you.
08:29Does Jeremy Renner know martial arts?
08:31I've never trained in any discipline.
08:34However, I've trained in all the disciplines for many years, if that makes any sense.
08:40It was all through stunts and training for five months in Taekwondo or five months in this or judo throws every day or whatever it might be
08:46to serve, whether it was Born Legacy or whatever the movie was calling for.
08:51I learned from Tom Cruise, I think one of the greatest at the game, on Mission Impossible, Ghost Protocol.
08:56He taught me how to train my body like I'm an athlete, a professional athlete, when it comes to stunts.
09:01And I took that advice and I ran with it to this day.
09:05And part of my recovery, I used that even as part of my recovery.
09:08My body awareness was a huge part of me on that ice.
09:12Treat your body like you're a professional athlete.
09:13That perspective that he gave me really kind of bleeds into many places in my life.
09:18And actually, thanks, Tom.
09:19Appreciate that.
09:21On the board, what do you got to say, Google?
09:23Our Jeremy Renner.
09:25Elizabeth Olsen friends.
09:27Yes, we're friends.
09:28I haven't seen her in a while.
09:29I miss her dearly.
09:30We got to do Wind River together.
09:31Before that, we were doing, obviously, we met in the Marvel Universe.
09:34Yeah, I miss her dearly.
09:35She's a very, very, very dear friend.
09:37Say hi to her if you see her.
09:38Our Jeremy Renner and Robert Downey friends.
09:41Yes, we are.
09:43Another blessing of being in the Marvel Universe is forging great friendships.
09:48You're with somebody for 12 years, and people have been through divorces and babies and marriages and all these things.
09:54And we're on not only our family chat for the OG Avengers, but also just as friends in life.
10:00I speak to him several times a week.
10:02And he's a huge, huge fan of Mary Kingstown.
10:04So he forces me to tell him all the stuff before it comes out.
10:08But yeah, of course, good buddy of mine.
10:10Let's go.
10:11Is Jeremy Renner in Lords of Dogtown?
10:12Yes, I am.
10:13Yeah, a short little small scene.
10:15I did it with some friends, and I think we shot for a week or something, or less than that.
10:19But it was good fun.
10:20I was in the Lords of Dogtown.
10:21Was Jeremy Renner James Bond?
10:23No, but I was James Coughlin in The Town.
10:26Maybe you've seen that movie.
10:27Do you know why people might be Googling that?
10:28I wear tuxes a lot, maybe.
10:30I'm in suits and maybe sort of Bond-ish.
10:33Or I look similar to Daniel Craig.
10:35Maybe that, too.
10:36And I'm not English, so I can't be cast as James Bond.
10:39Look, that's all the answers I have for you today.
10:41Don't Google me anymore.
10:42Peace.
10:43I'm out.