Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure is a 1989 American science fiction comedy film directed by Stephen Herek and written by Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon. The first installment of the Bill & Ted franchise, it stars Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter and George Carlin. The film follows two metalhead slacker high school students, Bill (Winter) and Ted (Reeves), who travel through time to assemble historical figures for their high-school history presentation.