By LOUIS B. HOBSON --

BEVERLY HILLS -- You can ask Keanu Reeves about touring with his band Dogstar.

You can ask him about his two new movies, the action thriller Chain Reaction and the black comedy Feeling Minnesota.

You can even ask him about growing up in Toronto, his stint last year as the melancholy Dane in the Winnipeg production of Hamlet.

But whatever you do, don't ask Keanu to sign an autograph.

Keanu, who is on a gruelling European and Asian tour with his band Dogstar, flew in to Los Angeles from Dublin to do interviews for Feeling Minnesota in which he plays a man who steals his brother's wife on their wedding night.

Keanu was cordial and even jovial. Instead of pinning a journalist's microphone on his T-shirt, he clipped it on his ear.

He avoided questions he didn't want to answer with an amiable and even playful shrug or a sigh. At the end of the interview, a journalist passed him a photo to sign.

Keanu's whole demeanor changed.

He muttered obscenities under his breath as he scribbled his name on the photo and then stormed out of the room.

The only other hint that Keanu was edgy came when a journalist informed him that his Speed co-star Sandra Bullock said she was terribly disappointed that he had passed on Speed and that she'd miss him a great deal.

"Yeah, sure and you believe that," countered Keanu.

When he saw the shocked reaction of the journalists, he quickly added "Sandra's a great actress. We got along well on Speed and I do hope maybe someday we can work together again."

It was at this exact moment that the autograph request came.

It was the straw that broke Keanu's back.


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