Aurea

This is my other half.

[ihavechuckie]

Local boys making `Good', staying grounded

Boston Herald, 22 February 1998.

Long before they were Hollywood's latest hot item, before their grinning faces were staring out at you from every magazine stand, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were the inseparable duo Aaron Stockard grew up with in Cambridge. They were the ones he played pickup basketball with in Dana Park, and with whom he sneaked into movies in Harvard Square.

They also were in the same tight group of guys who often made a beeline after school for Affleck's house on Cottage Street for endless hours of video baseball.

Now, Stockard confessed, he's making a beeline of a different sort. He has been scarfing up tabloids to see what they're saying about his boyhood buddies, Damon, 27, and Affleck, 25.

The movie they scripted and starred in, "Good Will Hunting," is up for nine Academy Awards next month.

"I know it sounds kinda cheesy," said a sheepish Stockard, 25, and a film student at Emerson College. "I'm their biggest fan. I don't want them to know I'm buying the tabloids to see what they're saying about my best friends."

Audiences have swarmed to the movie, which stars Damon as a South Boston juvenile delinquent who works as a janitor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and happens to be a mathematics genius. Affleck and his younger brother, Casey, play two of his Southie pals.

By the time the movie opened in December, stories about the Cambridge cohorts already had become the stuff of local legend.

The early Cambridge chronicles tell of Affleck and Damon, fast friends by elementary school, growing up two blocks from each other in Central Square.

It was during this time that Affleck became the first of the two to get an acting job. In the fourth grade, he landed a role in a PBSfilm, "Voyage of the Mimi," which is still shown in classrooms today.

The next chapters are of their high school days at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, where the two already were honing their acting skills in off-the-wall plays with teachers who have remained their mentors and friends.

And then there is the much-hyped Cinderella section, the five years the duo struggled to get a short story Damon wrote while at Harvard made into their now-blockbuster film.

Media hounding of family members has gotten so intense that the actors' moms recently did a very un-Cambridgelike thing and got their numbers unlisted, said Larry Aaronson, a Rindge and Latin history teacher and longtime friend of both families.

"It was at the request of their sons," he added, apologetically.

Affleck's mother, Chris, teaches at the Tobin Elementary School in Cambridge. Damon's mom, Nancy Carlsson-Paige, is a professor of childhood education at Cambridge's Lesley College.

Yet other family members and friends, who also have been tapped umpteen times for stories about the actors' local roots, are still answering their phones and clinging to their senses of humor.

"Hasn't everything already been told?" sighed Jay Jones, a professor at Lesley College who became a second father for Damon after Damon's folks split up when he was 2.

"I guess there's the pacifier story," Jones said, after thinking for a few minutes.

Unlike most of the Affleck-Damon tales, this one is from the pre-Cambridge days, when the Damon family lived on Bennington Street in Newton and Damon was about 3.

"It came to the day when Matt was deciding whether he was going to keep his pacifier. He talked about it with his mom. Bennington Street is narrow, and the house was at the end of the dead end. The garbage truck would back in," said Jones. "Matt went out this fateful day, proudly walked to the end of the driveway and threw his pacifier in the back of the truck."

The story, Jones said, is a good illustration of the supportive, creative environment in which Damon was raised.

Jones was the one who organized Damon's mom, and five other free-spirited teachers, in their 1981 move to Auburn Street in Cambridge. There the communal group bought a garish, pink aluminum-sided house and turned it into a six-family co-op. Jones still lives there. Damon's mom recently remarried and moved to Somerville.

By all accounts, both Damon and Affleck grew up in unabashedly liberal Cambridge households, and though their respective parents divorced when the kids were young, all parties are still on good terms.

Damon's dad, Kent, is a retired investment banker who lives in Boston. Affleck's dad lives on the West Coast, working as a drug and alcohol rehab counselor.

"Can you call me back in 20 minutes?" asked Kyle Damon, 30, a Cambridge sculptor. "I'm on the other line with my brother now."

When he gets off the phone, Damon says he has been trying to talk his kid brother into running a marathon together. No, not Boston. His actor brother is too busy right now filming yet another sure-to-be-a-hit movie. Maybe they'll do the New York Marathon in the fall. He's on his way out the door, so he passes the phone to his wife, Lori Nollet Damon, who is holding a crying 9-month-old.

It was a former roommate of Lori Damon's who helped spark a key part of the plot of "Good Will Hunting."

Years earlier, when she was dating Kyle Damon, Lori lived in Cambridgeport with several roommates, including a nuclear physicist at MIT. Kyle Damon went to visit him at work one day and noticed a math problem on a blackboard. Passers-by were invited to try to solve it.

Kyle scrawled out some numbers as a joke on the board. He didn't solve the problem, but caused quite a stir at MIT, where students and teachers were baffled by his numbers. The story was told to Matt at dinner one night and the rest, is well, history.

Lori's favorite Matt Damon story?

This one is from last summer, when their son, Jackson, was 2 months old and Kyle and Lori were still nervous new parents. "He'd cry, and we couldn't figure out why," she said. "Matt lay down on the bed with him and he'd sing to him. He sang `Afternoon Delight,' and other hokey songs from the '70s and early '80s. He was better than Kyle and I at entertaining him. Jackson was mesmerized."

In their circle of boyhood friends, Damon was the athlete, and a phenomenal break dancer who used to perform in Harvard Square for spare change.

Affleck, a little sensitive about his lack of athletic prowess, was the brainy, charismatic ringleader, according to Stockard, their chum who now attends Emerson College.

"It felt like Ben never went through that nerdy stage we did," said Stockard. "We were all stressing about whether the girl in music class liked us. Ben never worried about that stuff."

But Affleck did have some downers.

There was the time, Stockard said, when the teenaged Affleck was fired from his ticket-taking job at the Janus movie theater in Harvard Square.

"He got fired for being late all the time," said Stockard. "In a show of support, Matt stormed in and quit as well. Manual labor wasn't their thing. I think they figured that out early."

Both graduated from Cambridge Rindge and Latin - Damon in 1988, Affleck in 1990.

From there, Damon went to Harvard, which he attended on and off while landing bit parts in movies such as "Mystic Pizza" and "School Ties."

It was at Harvard where he dated Skylar Satenstein, the woman "Hunting's" Skylar was modeled after. The real-life Skylar is now an emergency-room doctor in California and married to the drummer in the band Metallica, Lori Damon said.

Affleck, too, landed bit parts after graduation, including a role in "School Ties." He attended the University of Vermont and Occidental College in Los Angeles. Damon would sometimes stay at the apartment Affleck and Stockard shared in Los Angeles between gigs. "We were living in a tiny shack, a miserable house," Stockard recalled.

But, shortly after 1992, the young actors would start to see success. Affleck would land roles in "Dazed and Confused," "Chasing Amy," "Mallrats" and "Going All the Way."

Damon would appear in "Courage Under Fire" - a role for which he lost 40 pounds to play a junkie soldier - "Geronimo: An American Legend" and most recently "The Rainmaker."

These days, when they're not making movies, both men are courting two of Hollywood's leading ladies. Affleck is dating Gwyneth Paltrow. Damon, who had been seeing "Hunting" co-star Minnie Driver, is now dating Winona Ryder.

With their Hollywood acting careers now in overdrive, Affleck and Damon, both busy shooting separate movies, have made it a point to stay close to their families and boyhood friends.

Those bonds, said one of their former Rindge and Latin High School teachers, keep the cohorts from Cambridge from slipping into Hollywood idol isolation.

"Fame has happened so fast, you hope they can stay grounded," Aaronson said.

[ihavechuckie]

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon on the set of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back

AICN - Mysterio's Week SIX Report From JAY & SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK!!!

First posted on AICN on March 7, 2001

‘JAY and SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK’ – On-Set Production Report

WEEK SIX – Part I

For the record, Harry’s previous ranting and raving in last weeks column about the party we’re obviously all concocted from his own fan boy induced delusions, which for the most part are all lies I tell ya, all lies.

February 20th through February 25th, 2001.

"WOULD YOU LOOK AT THESE MOROSE MOTHERFUCKERS HERE." –

Tuesday, Day 25

Today, filming takes place inside a rented loft somewhere in LA, which is a rare find. Kudos to the production team for finding this one as they did. It’s actually used for building furniture I’m told, but today the production is using it as Holden McNeil’s loft.

Many cool items adorn the walls, such as original ‘Bluntman & Cronic’ comic artwork, as well as Scott Mosier’s original "$100 bill" sketch used in ‘CHASING AMY’. From the looks of the place, Holden’s been keeping quite busy for himself since we last saw him in ‘AMY’.

As it’s Ben’s first day, and he has only two scheduled days to shoot all his stuff for the film, the shooting schedule for today is very tight. Six pages of dialog between Holden, Jay and Silent Bob must be shot and wrapped by days end. You guys know how much six pages of Kev’s dialog can be, so you pretty much have an idea of the schedule crunch that the cast and crew is in for today.

Inside the loft is cramped and crowded with crew and equipment, and the safest place to keep from the camera’s view, and out of the way, is upstairs.

Kev catches me between set ups and asks if I’ve met Ben yet.

"No" I say, and he motions me with a little wave, to follow him outside to the craft service table where I see Ben standing, peeling the shell from a hardboiled egg.

Kev kindly introduces me and informs Ben I’m from AICN, and soon Ben and I are left standing, conversing about. He asks me such questions as to how long I’ve written for AICN, how I came to know Harry and such. He’s clearly familiar with the site. First impression of Ben, the man is tall. Second, he’s extremely friendly and charismatic, and when you speak to him, his attention is focused directly on you and what you have to say.

As we talk, I manage to slip out the obligatory "interview" request, and ask if he has some free time today, that we might sit down for a few minutes to talk and answer some of your questions.

"Sure." he says, and that’s it. More than happy to do it, without the slightest bit of hesitation.

Later Kev takes the time out (yet again) to introduce me to Jim from ‘WIZARD’ magazine. He’s down here for a few days to check things out and do a cameo later in the week.

During the course of the day, as time gets tighter and tighter, I realize that any chance of doing an interview with Ben is pretty much shot. Ben finds me later and apologizes as he assures me that we’ll do it tomorrow, when he has fewer lines of dialog. He indicates that he really wants to do it and take the time to answer some of your questions.

Running in at a lean, mean 13 hours, the day finally comes to an end. The crew wraps a productive and successful day with Ben, and as always, it’s back to the lot for dailies.

"JUST SOME ‘GOOD WILL’ BOYS" – Wednesday, Day 26

I arrive early in the morning at the lot, on Stage 14 to find shuttle buses full of extras being unloaded out onto set. Only a small portion of the stage is being used today for a scene featuring Ben Affleck and Matt Damon. For some reason, the set seems more crowded than usual today, even with the 25 or so extras.

As the extras are gathered, PA’s search through to find a few "feature extras", which pretty much assures them some up close screen time, rather that just an out of focus blur in the background.

With all that’s going on, it’s a bit of a madhouse to get everyone situated, and set up the numerous shots that need to be completed today. Add to the fact that Matt just literally flew in from filming ‘OCEAN’S ELEVEN’ to do his cameo. Plus, he’s only available to shoot until 7pm tonight before he has to hop a plane and jet back to the ‘OCEAN’S ELEVEN’ set for shooting the next day.

There are also 3 _ pages scheduled to be shot today, involving some effects as well.

I later notice "SPIKE, MIKE, SLACKERS AND DYKES" author and indie film guru, John Pierson and his family stop by on set for a visit. If you have any interest in independent filmmaking, and the business, I cannot strongly enough recommend this book. It’s essential reading, and entertaining at the same time as Kevin collaborates with Pierson in the discussion of indie cinema, adding some of his own trial and tribulations in making films outside the studio system.

10:44 am - Kev yells cut, and calls Ben and Matt back over to the playback monitors and instructs them on what he’s like to see on the next take.

It’s obvious to see that Ben and Matt are having a great time working together again, and after a few more tries they finally get the take Kev wants and they move on to another setup.

Mark Hamill pops up on stage to show Kevin some makeup tests for his role shooting this Friday. Matt and Ben come over and stand beside Kev, taking a moment before realizing that it’s Mark Hamill underneath the makeup. They then show a little "fanboy" admiration, shaking his hand and expressing their pleasure in meeting him.

I later have the opportunity to show a little "fanboy" appreciation of my own as I chat a bit with Mark. We talk a little about his role as the Joker in the ‘Batman’ animated series he did alongside Paul Dini. He tells me he thoroughly enjoyed playing that character so much that he quickly goes into reciting one of his Joker monologues, complete with Joker voice.

I ask him how he feels to be a part of ‘JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK’, to which he says, "Yeah its great. Now in the eyes of my kids, I look really cool again." His kids are obvious fans.

Brian Lynch, Jeff Anderson, Ali Larter and Dave Mandel all stop by on set and hang out briefly. I converse briefly with Jeff about his film project an he shows me the script he’s written that he’s currently in pre-production on, to direct himself.

Later in the evening, as the camera and lights are being set up for the next shot, Ben finds me and asks, "You ready to do this thing?"

"Yeah, let’s do it." I say.

Just as Ben and I are set to do the interview, Matt comes up and stands beside me. Matt and I exchange a few words until Ben jokingly gives Matt a warning to "watch out what you say around this guy -- he’s from Ain’t-It-Cool!" We laugh and I soon excuse myself to go with Ben to do the interview before he’s called back on set.

Ben and I find some open chairs by the monitors and sit. He politely offers to hold my tape recorder for me as I flip though some of your questions to ask him.

MYSTERIO: Ok Ben, first question.

"Ryan Free" asks: "Ben, what’s your favorite View Askew movie?"

BEN AFFLECK: Probably, um, well I mean ‘CLERKS’ in a way just cause I saw that without kind of being in it. You know when you do something you always have a degree of exposure to it where you never really quite get to enjoy it. But the best work experience I had was with ‘CHASING AMY’, but I really, really like ‘DOGMA’ as well. I just hate ‘MALLRATS’.

"Adam Daniel" asks: "What’s your favorite memory on set with Kevin?"

BEN: One of the cool things is that I became friends with Kevin on ‘MALLRATS’ and we hung out and stuff, but the best kind of memories, most that I have, are just from the fact that when we did ‘CHASING AMY’ I stayed at his house, kind of on his couch, and so he used to like come home, watch dailies, and then I would school him in Sega hockey every night. Playing Sega hockey with Kevin Smith, I thought it was like playing basketball with Michael Jordan, you know what I mean? Here’s the guy that personally popularized the sport, so that had to be the high point. I think I still owe him $1200 bucks or something from that.

"Jason Revington" asks: "What aspects of Kevin’s writing and filmmaking is it that keeps you coming back to do his films when you can make much more money doing other films?"

BEN: Well if I just did stuff based on just money alone, I would’ve done a lot of it and never would have done a lot of the movies I did. And you know some of them turn out to be good, and some didn’t work as well. I mean for one thing, Kevin’s writing is very distinct and I think we share a similar sense of humor, so I just find his stuff really, really funny and we also have a similar kind of sensibility. Also, nobody would give you like giant hunks of dialog to work with like Kevin does. You’ll find like one, two or three sentences are virtually a monologue in movies today. As an actor, maybe it’s selfish, but you want to be able to work more and I get that opportunity with Kevin, and whether it works of falls flat, its always interesting and fun for me to work on personally.

"Jon Moody" asks: "Do you think Kevin’s movies have made you more famous than say playing roles in movies like ‘Armageddon’?

BEN: No definitely not. The sector of people that know Kevin Smith or who are big Kevin Smith fans, often times seems like this huge presence on the Internet. When I go out on the world it’s very rare that people ever say to me or talk about Kevin’s movies. They tend to be in a certain demographic, like younger. The people that do know Kevin’s movies really know, and are aware of it and care about it and are more die-hard fans, but movies like ‘ARMAGEDDON’ have a much broader scope because they’re not as specific and they don’t have the same pointed, specific point of view. There’s a lot of people that just don’t identify with Kevin’s worldview.

"Sam Haddad" asks: "With your experiences in bigger movies and with bigger stars, how would you say your experiences with Kevin and the crew compare to the more larger budgeted studio films that you’ve worked on? Are these films any more or less fun or satisfying to do?"

BEN: Well he makes a very good point in the sense that from the very first time when I went and did ‘MALLRATS’ I was shocked. I was working with a guy for the first time who’s my age and it was easily the most kind of fun, good-natured, happy go lucky, just pleasant set to be on and initially then when the movie kind of didn’t pan out, I thought, "Well, there ya go. You can’t have fun or the movie’s gonna be a disaster." But it was the same when I did ‘CHASING AMY’, which did very well and ‘DOGMA’ and now this. It just makes it fun to come to work and I always think I do better work when I feel comfortable. Some people want to create drama, anxiety and tension and problems that’s like an indicator that they are, in fact working. Where as for me, I think I’m better the more relaxed and at ease I am and that’s definitely a hallmark of Kevin Smith.

"Belinda Hillard asks: Ben, any plans to write some more scripts now that you’ve wrapped ‘PEARL HARBOR’"?

BEN: (laughs) Yeah, actually Matt and I were just talking about that. I think the strike, in a funny way, whether it happens or not and even if it doesn’t happen, I think there will be a 3 month kind of de facto work stoppage because studios have more product than they need and no one will have prepped anything. So either way, it’s gonna be a kind of a summer vacation and I probably will take the rest of the year off. We’re making plans to… in fact we were just talking about that in the trailer today, we’re talking about what to do, what to write, and what kind of stuff we wanted to get into. So yeah, definitely.

End of Part 1 interview with Ben Affleck.

In Part 2, Ben let’s loose about his feelings on the pros and cons of fame and fortune, his thoughts on his last turn at possibly playing Holden McNeil, landing the role as the new Jack Ryan, and playing the odds at Blackjack.

I’ll also try and finish up my weeks end coverage as well.

Part II will hopefully find its way on-line later in the week. So keep an eye out for it.

-Mysterio

AICN - Mysterio's Week SIX Report From JAY & SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK!!! (Part 2)

First posted on AICN on March 12, 2001

‘JAY and SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK’ – On-Set Production Report

WEEK SIX – Part II

To clear up any confusion in Part One’s report, let me clarify to you that when Ben was quoted as saying that he “hated ‘MALLRATS’,” he was, in fact, clearly joking.

February 20th through February 25th, 2001.

PART 2 INTERVIEW with BEN AFFLECK – Wednesday, Day 26

In continuing our discussion where we left off last with the upcoming ‘PEARL HARBOR’ I ask Ben:

MYSTERIO: Would you view ‘PEARL HARBOR’ as being on the same scope, in terms of production and ambition, as ‘TITANIC’?

BEN: I think its similar in the sense that you have a love story set against the kind of epic backdrop of a true life event from history that people are aware of, but some maybe don’t know much about. But it’s a totally different movie. One of the things I really like about ‘PEARL HARBOR’ is that its very much like a classic movie. A kind of movie that could have been done, four - five years after the war ended if they had the capacity to make movies then the way they do now, which they didn’t in terms of effects and that kind of thing. In tone and spirit, it’s very much a classic Hollywood movie, and that I’m really excited about.

MYSTERIO: What’s the most absurd rumor you’ve heard about yourself?

BEN: Uh, they’re quite a few.

MYSTERIO: What’s the one that rings most true?

BEN: What’s the one the rings most true? Well besides just being gay, you know, just gay as the wind, there’s so much silly stuff. I get a big kick out of it. I’m like surprised by these people who act like shocked and indignant, that I’m just kind of flattered that anybody would give enough of a shit to make up some silly ass story about me.

MYSTERIO: Had you heard the rumors a while ago that had you playing ‘BATMAN’?

BEN: Now that’s not even fun, those are just like movie rumors, I’m talking about the ones where they say that I’m like dating Princess Leia and shit, which IS a fantasy. But you know I think they always will do that anytime there’s a movie that comes up. It’s like people think up who they think might be, might do it and stuff, so they name a bunch of names. No one has ever called me or said anything about me playing ‘BATMAN’, so that’s not true.

MYSTERIO: What’s you definition of success?

BEN: Being proud of what you’ve done and being happy. And marrying your personal life or your professional life.

MYSTERIO: What do you most like and dislike about your fame?

BEN: Its presented more work opportunities for me that are really exciting. And the dislike - the consequence it has for other people who didn’t ask to have any involvement and who didn’t kind of make the agreement that I made -‘cause I can’t really bitch.

MYSTERIO: How do you challenge yourself from an artistic standpoint?

BEN: You try to do something different every time, and try to find something that challenges you. I always feel challenged in some way, its really hard. What I never realized before I started working as an actor is how truly difficult it is to make a movie work. Even a movie like, we made a joke about ‘FORCES OF NATURE’ here ya know, those movies are very hard to execute well, kind of Cary Grant, romantic comedies, sort of Doris Day things. They’re not easy to do and neither are thrillers and this is why ‘THE SIXTH SENSE’ is one of my favorite movies of all time. Some people, when it first came out dismissed it as kind of a genre movie, where as I think they’re exceedingly difficult to do and do well. So anytime you do a movie there’s an inherent, serious challenge in it just to make it work.

MYSTERIO: What’s it feel like to win an Oscar?

BEN: Surreal. The closet thing I’ve ever experienced to an out-of-body experience. It feels in some ways like, you know, a car accident – everything moves in slow motion and it feels like it’s not real. That’s what it felt like.

MYSTERIO: How’s your Blackjack game lately?

[** It’s been reported that last August, Affleck won $140,000 playing the tables at the Hard Rock casino in Vegas, and gave his winnings to the staff. In January of this year, it was reported he lost about $40,000 at the same casino. **]

BEN: (laughs) Uh, it’s an up and down game. You know the house does have an edge; you gotta keep that in mind. But I had fun. The most important thing is don’t, don’t bet more than you can afford to lose and STOP when you’re ahead, that’s the hardest thing to do. And have fun.

MYSTERIO: Now you’ve worked with Bruce Willis on ‘ARMAGEDDON’ and recently now with Sam “the man” Jackson on the film ‘CHANGING LANES’, just who’s cooler?

BEN: Whoa, now that’s a tough contest. I don’t want to get in the way because both of them could kick my ass, so I have to stand out of the way. But they’re both pretty cool guys. On this film we’re doing, we call him “Slam Jackson”, because it just seems like a cool nickname, but I don’t call him that to his face ‘cause I’m afraid he’ll kick my ass.

MYSTERIO: How easy it for you to recite Kevin’s dialog?

BEN: I forgot how difficult it was. I reminds of how they used to train actors just in breathing, ‘cause like you’d go out and do these long soliloquies from ‘Oedipus’ or something.

MYSTERIO: They still do.

BEN: (laughs) Yeah, they still do! I simply don’t do that training anymore, but I obviously need to, to do just like these thick ass, long speeches and it becomes more or less (laughing)… its like halfway through you’re just about surviving. So when he doesn’t really do coverage you know you’re gonna ruin the whole take if you stop. I just try to remember all the words and get to the end.

MYSTERIO: What are your feelings about Holden’s final proposition to Alyssa and Banky and how satisfied are you with how ‘AMY’ ended?

BEN: I was definitely very satisfied with how ‘AMY’ ended. I really liked the kind of ambiguity of it and the resignation he had, to just the fact that like, the series of mistakes that he made. I had a hard time trying to wrap my mind around the leap of logic that he took to try to propose the 3-way like that. But I do understand that people, like get faced with that. You know you get that ‘rock in a hard place thing’ and a lot of people have it with they’re best friends and they’re girlfriends. I think not outside - it’s on the very peripheral of things that are conceivable, but it’s not outside of that and so I tried to make it work as hard as I can. I don’t think I ever quite completely understood exactly where he’s coming from and in a sense probably failed in that regard. About the ending, I have no qualms. I really like the ending. Although I always thought that they would probably end up back together in some regard, but Kev’s kept that sort of secret.

MYSTERIO: What are your feelings about ‘JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK’ being the final film in the Jersey chronicles, and how do you feel the character of Holden McNeil has progressed from the ending of ‘AMY’ to where he’s at now?

BEN: (laughs) If you think this is the last time you’re gonna see Jay and Silent Bob in a Kevin Smith movie, you’re high on crack. Obviously, the dude has a total obsession, fixation with himself and these two characters and he’s been promising this’ll be the last time they’d show up in… forever. He’s endless writing ‘JAY AND SILENT BOB’ comic book. He loves the Jay and Silent Bob racket. It’s been good to him. And with Holden, he’s wised up a little bit he’s having more fun. He kind of fucks with Jay and Silent Bob, which is nice. He’s a little more mature; he’s made a little more money and I think he’s stop taking everything quite so much to heart, in the sense that he’s not as easily kind of wounded and heavy hearted as he was.

MYSTERIO: Now after this you’re ready to start filming ‘THE SUM OF ALL FEARS’…

BEN: Yeah, in fact we just shot the first two days.

MYSTERIO: Cool. What do you plan to bring to the character of Jack Ryan that’s different from what we’ve seen with either Baldwin or Ford?

BEN: Well you know, I really admire and respect both of those guys, and I really liked the movies they did. So I’m certainly not going out on the approach of like, “ah, they did a shitty job” because you know if those guys wanted to do it, I’d just be buying a ticket. But it’s different because I’m younger. I’ve went down and spent some time at the CIA, which is incredible, and did a lot of research. One of the things I’m gonna try and make him is just a much more innocent, and focus a little more on the details. When I first took it on, I thought “god, it’s gonna be so hard for me to say the line, like I’m in the CIA,” because I just think, you know that its kind of like saying “I’m Superman.” I mean if they’re real, it’s got all this weight. Then I went to the CIA, and it’s just kind of like a college grad school gang and immediately I felt comfortable and I felt totally like “I can totally do this. There’s nobody here as cool as Harrison Ford or Alec Baldwin.” So, that was a relief to me and other than that I think it’s a good story and we’ve got a really good director (Phil Alden Robinson) and a good script and I just hope that it works somewhere near as well as those movies did because they we’re terrific.

MYSTERIO: Have you had a chance to discuss the role with either Tom Clancy or Harrison Ford?

BEN: I’ve spent a lot of time talking with Clancy, e-mailing him back and forth, and then I went down to his house. I’m a big believer in respecting the original writer of something and I think the reason why Clancy’s books sell so popularly is because people like him. They like what he writes. One of the reasons I think is because of his detail and level. You feel like he really knows what he’s talking about so I wanted to spend as much time as I could with him, and Phil’s spent a lot of time talking to him and getting notes from him. So he’s been involved in this. I hope he’ll continue to be involved in more of a capacity, in as much as he wants. And I called Harrison Ford just kind of out of respect, and just because I wanted to get his blessing, and he was really nice.

MYSTERIO: Lastly, how excited are you to see ‘JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK’ with an audience when it opens in theatres everywhere on August 10th?

BEN: Very excited. It’s always fun, these movies, particularly Kevin’s movies, when like the first weekend is when all the die-hard people that really love his movies go and get all the jokes. And it’s a stand-alone movie, but the other thing about this movie is that it’s just a comedy; it’s just supposed to be fun. You know what I mean? It will succeed or fail based on whether or not you laugh. And that’s kind of freeing. It doesn’t have to be profound, it doesn’t have to be anything but just funny and if it’s not funny it’ll suck. But I think that will be the audience that’ll be most inclined to laugh, so that’ll be the audience I go see it with. So yeah, I’m pretty fired up, it should be fun.

[** Just then, Ben gets called back on set. **]

MYSTERIO: Thanks for taking the time out to answer some fan questions, including a few of my own.

BEN: No problem. I look forward to downloading and reading it sometime.

And off he and Matt went to continue filming, as I’m left thinking, “wow, very cool interview.” And then reality hits. “Oh fuck, now I’ve got to transcribe all of this?!?!?”

Hope you all enjoyed it half as much as I did conducting it. Ben gave a great, engaging interview, and proved to me that he’s the real deal (like with most of the VA bunch) and if he hadn’t been called back, I’m sure we’d have talked quite a bit more. But alas, there’s a movie to make here, so back to the weeks end coverage.

“TO THE BLUNTCAVE!” – Thursday, Day 27

Before heading off to the secret location of ‘The Bluntcave’ (pssst! Stage 19), the crew grabs a few quick insert shots on Stage 14.

Now, as I reach the huge “elephant door” to Stage 19, it slowly begins to open, revealing to me for the very first time, The Bluntcave!

Simply put in describing this sweet looking set, think of what the Batcave was to Batman, the Bluntcave is to Kevin.

It’s looks like it’s from a comic book brought to life, even down to the colors from the lightening, which compliment the set, accentuating it in all the right places.

There’s going to be some serious stuff happening on this set, including some thrilling action sequences, which Kev is on set with the stunt players to rehearse blocking some scenes to be shot in the next few days.

“STILL AT THE BLUNTCAVE!” – Friday, Day 28

This is Mark Hamill’s first day in full make-up and costume on set in The Bluntcave.

Mark is even doing a few stunts with the team as well, as Kev directs from behind the “video village”.

As Mark takes a break, he takes the time to chat with several of the cast and crewmembers. I over hear him chatting about, among other things, ‘Star Wars’ which even this fanboy cannot resist eavesdropping on. Too cool, but wait, it gets even cooler.

“HANGING OUT AT THE BLUNTCAVE” – Saturday, Day 29

This is the first 6 day shoot, and I’m able to be on set in the early am, because I’m able to san the Monday to Friday day job I have.

As I arrive, I see several champagne bottle lined up on a craft table.

Kev approaches me and we chat for a bit, and then I inquire about all the champagne bottles.

“It’s to celebrate our 200th roll of film shot.” He tells me. As the roll is finished and changed, the corks are soon popped, and cups of bubbly are passed about. Since Kev doesn’t drink alcohol, he opts for a bowl of ‘Lucky Charms’ instead. A fitting cereal of choice me thinks.

Today mainly consists of filming several choreographed action sequences, which is tiring and slow paced due to the several camera set ups and lighting which takes place, and really only proves interesting once the scenes are all cut together.

Speaking of cutting, Scott stayed up all night last night editing some of the fight sequences shot with Mark and the stunt team on Friday. It’s a rough assembly, but Scott has even thrown in a temp track – “Duel of the Fates” from Episode I. The cast and crew gather round the monitors and watch about a minute of two of the cut footage. It really sets the mood among the cast and crew as all love what they see, even in rough form, and seem excited at the payoff their work will yield.

I talk a little more with Mark Hamill at the end of the day and ask him about doing a little interview if he wouldn’t mind. Mark is more than happy to do it, but seems concerned in not discussing spoilers, as he’s signed a confidentiality clause in his contract.

I assure him the interview will be spoiler-free, and he agrees.

After a long full day of shooting, Kev invites Mark to check out some of his dailies from the day before.

I ride back to base camp with Mark, and then later to dailies with him.

After dailies, everyone soon leaves, and all that’s left in the room is Kev, Mark… and me!

I stay behind, and am witness to the coolest thing any fanboy who grew up loving the ‘Star Wars’ films would cherish – spending about an hour and a half, treated to Mark Hamill relishing about his experiences, both personal and trivial that no one’s ears outside this room right now would be privy too. During this Kev and I just look at one another, fan-to-fan, nod and smile wide as to how cool a moment this is.

Later as Mark’s van waits to take him home, I thank Kev for allowing me to share in the moment. “Would you ever, in a million years, guess you’d be in a room, talking with Luke Skywalker himself, on a rainy Saturday night in LA all these years later?” Kev smiles and agrees with me wholeheartedly.

NEXT WEEK:

More Bluntcave, birthdays, catfights, and hanging out with Banky Edwards himself, Jason Lee!

And for all those who thought I’d forgotten about Mewes’s quote, fear not as here it is!

“Cup the balls and stroke the cock.” - Jay

-Mysterio

[bostonyaoi]

my contribution for the mattfleck zine by the amazing @vanillaskys !!

[thinking4ore-you]

No i know i'm not the only one sensing this sexual tension...

I'm literally going to die-

WHAT IS GOING ON!!!

Matt's looks ... touching his lips ... creasing it.. Biting it ... intense eye contact with Ben... he didn't look away once ...

He wanted to jump on that stage and just... devour him...

And Ben.. he knew what he's doing.. flirting... all his mischievous answers...

This interview is sooo important to me... and i'm so bad at editing but i'm going to share my favorite moments from it on my blog... because i think something was going on that day with them...the amount of sexual tension between them was unbearable... but also there were some mind numbingly love filled parts in it too... the way ben was talking and the way matt was watching him... studying him...

Okay.. i'll stop now ... to be continued...

[ihavechuckie]

On 10 October 2000 at 7:00 PM, Ben Affleck recorded an episode of Inside the Actors Studio at the Tishman Auditorium of New School University (66 West 12th Street, NYC). Just two days prior, on 8 October, Matt Damon celebrated his 30th birthday. Matt flew back from Paris that day, and he and Ben enjoyed a private dinner before joining a crowd of regulars at a hotel for a larger celebration.

[yourcherrykisser]

rare aesthetic: he called you his date at the golden globes, you went to college with him, you shared a bank account, comforted him after his divorce, said he was one of the "great loves of my life", told him news about the role you got before you told your wife, had matching good luck necklaces as children, fought to keep him in your film and vice versa, shared an oscar with him, lived with him, he said that you basically changed his life and helped his career, literally admitted you found it painful when he dated another woman... which could mean nothing.

[chemicalarospec]

mattben in literally the first minute of the new Tommyinnit video yes you read that right Tom (who has a new interview show if you didn't know) asks "when you get these roles you do you tell first" Matt says "I immediately called my wife but she was in a zoom call and couldn't pick up so then I called Ben Affleck" and then Ben told his wife (they were in the same office building) and his wife asked why he didn't tell her first 😭

[mattnben-bennmatt]

Ben Affleck on how Good Will Hunting was created (March 2020)

The way that movie started was [Matt Damon] was in a— it was actually a directing class, but he had taken all the acting classes at college. And I had already moved out to L.A. to start acting and he was about to come out to L.A. that summer. And I came back into town and he said, "Do you want to come to my directing class? I want to do a scene," and I was like, "What is the scene that you want to do?" "I have this idea about a guy who's a really smart guy but he's not educated." He wanted to basically play a guy from South Boston who's really smart and people underestimated. And I was like, "That's a really good idea!" And we sat down and he wrote some stuff, a scene, for that. And then after we performed it for a guy named David Wheeler [...] nobody seemed to like the scene in the class. But we thought it was good. And we thought— we used to talk about "We should really write this! We should really write this!" And we were just young enough to be so incredibly stupid and naive that we thought we actually should do it and that someone might make it. Which would have been on its face a completely absurd idea. But we pursued it and we had fun. So he had come up with the idea of this character and he was like, "Who do you want to be?" "I want to do a guy who's the Mercutio; the funnier character who tells stories." I mean, yes, I definitely wasn't the first guy to come up with the funny-but-likable best friend guy, who the audience gives permission to be a little more outrageous than the protagonist in some ways. You know, sidekick. That role was juicy. All I ever get to audition for is the bully throwing kids into lockers. And I want to be funny. And I think you could be interesting— there's an interesting tension between a guy who grew up in the neighborhood but is destined for bigger things, and his friends reluctantly recognizing that. So that was built around the idea of a scene saying: it's his friend, in fact—not the Robin Williams character—that gets him to push off from where he's moored and sail off into the world. Where he feels like— even his best friend feels like, "Yeah, love you and want to hang out with you, but this is where you belong."

[velvetbags]

d.d — the weeknd

Famed Hollywood actor Ben Affleck is forced into hiding after a scandal that nearly ended his career. He goes back to South Boston, his hometown, hoping time and distance will make the public forget.

Desperate to distract himself, he wanders into a dingy strip club, where he sees a familiar face.

His childhood friend, now on the pole, wearing next to nothing, who goes by the name of Nomad.

[trash--dragon]

there's an interview from 1998 with matt damon and robin williams and right at the end the interviewer asks robin if he has somebody that he would consider an equivalent to what ben is to matt and he says he does and then he says that (apart from a few close male friends) it's his wife. Which, you know.

[mattnben-bennmatt]

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon on co-directing a movie

Interviewed by Moviefone while promoting The RIP (16 January 2026)

-

Q: Well, you've acted together, you've written together, you've produced together. Is there a desire to direct together?

MATT: Well, he doesn't need the help.

BEN: I would! I mean, you know, and I actually wouldn't want Matt to do that, because he's going to be such— Matt really is a good director. He understands everything about filmmaking. I think the reason why he hasn't done it has to do more with a lifestyle— kids, it's very time-consuming also. And also as a function of all the other opportunities available to him. And I would not want him to direct and not accrue the credit and respect for it. Because I mean, I know how talented he is. I often rely on him. "What do you think of this? What do you think of that?" And he's got a very— I mean, the value of experience and taste, so much of it is having seen what works and what doesn't. And those instincts of understanding how to play a scene, how to write a scene: that is directing. I mean, it really is.

MATT: Well, and I think when we did Air together— You know, mostly if you're the lead of a movie, I always see it as a partnership with the director.

BEN: That was as much a collaboration— Frankly, it was a co-direction de facto.

MATT: But like, normally, the reality is the actor, you're the junior partner. And you have to be on board with that because it's a director's medium. So if you have a competing view with the director, you're going to lose because it's the director's movie. But with Ben, I think because of our history and because, you know, it really did feel like all of those— There would be no difference if you say— You know what I mean?

BEN: Working with Matt, I feel like I could just go home. If I'm not in the scene, I would be totally comfortable— Like, you know, we both have the same intention. And frankly, you know, the lead actor is doing a lot of directing of the movie from inside the movie. That's a way they actually can really put a hand on the scales that you can't. You look at the monitor, you're helpless. You can do nothing. You're watching. You're, you know, an observer. And yeah, you step in afterward, and you have conversations, but— That movie really was like co-directed. Totally. Because it's about who you trust, what do you think, and the relationship you foster, the environment that gets created.

Q: In Air?

BEN: Yeah.

Q: Yeah, love it. Very, very collaborative.

-

[What do you mean, their immediate response is always showering the other with praise? Matt saying Ben doesn't need the help, Ben saying he does, but Matt's such a great director that Ben wouldn't want him to have to share the limelight when he makes his directorial debut. Just so everyone else gets to see how talented Matt is. Or how Matt always feels like the junior partner in the director-lead actor relationship, but that with Ben, things are so equal between them that it makes no difference who's officially directing the movie. And Ben confirming that Air was de facto co-directed, such was the extent to which he relied on Matt's input. That he trusts Matt so much, and their tastes align so well, that he'd feel comfortable walking away and leaving Matt to handle things. That effectively, Matt already holds all the power when the cameras are rolling. That their joint contributions are so inextricable that assigning authorship in such a way becomes meaningless.

I honestly love it when they go into the ins and outs of their creative partnership. And as much as I adore all facets of it, there are always some very interesting dynamics that crop up whenever they venture into the directing side of things. I'm fascinated by how people deal with the feeling of agency in their lives and how that affects their interpersonal relationships. And in the case of Matt and Ben, I think it's very telling how they behave in the face of a potential power differential.

The director ultimately has creative control.

“When I first started getting work, I felt like acting was the most important thing,” he says. “But the more you do it, the more you realize that in the end, the director has all the power.”

— From Matt Damon’s interview with GQ (December 2011).

I find it fascinating how Matt built his career around carefully putting himself in the hands of great directors. And that Ben's own career almost came crumbling down because he was too optimistic about his power as the lead actor to shape the outcomes of a project.

Affleck: But you [Matt] were more savvy and smarter [about picking roles]. I remember you saying, “I really just am looking at the director.” I wouldn’t have turned down Spielberg or Scorsese or any of the incredible directors that you worked with, but you also knew that was the key to things earlier than I did, and you had maybe more discipline about what roles you chose during that period. Damon: But from the time we were kids, Ben and I went to the movies all the time with our friends, right? Didn’t matter what was playing. We could walk out of a movie and eight of us would be like, “Oh, that was terrible.” And Ben would go, “Yeah, but you know what would have made it better? If this happened and then that happened...”, and he would script-doctor the movie in the parking lot. He would get into these movies where he knew how to fix it, but he didn’t have the power to fix it. Affleck: They call it wishful thinking. Damon: And once he started directing, the whole trajectory of his career changed, because he was the person making those decisions and it always reflected in the work.

— Interviewed for Empire Magazine (18 December 2025).

In the late 2000's, Ben ended up in the director's chair out of necessity. With his acting career suffocating under an avalanche of disappointing movies and tabloid scandals, taking on the reins behind the cameras seemed to be the only way to survive in the industry. A chance to win or fail on his own merits, not because of someone else's choices. It's at once a powerful and vulnerable position to be in.

Damon’s not naive: He knows that if he sucks as a director, it will be a very public failure. “There are just too many decisions over the course of too long a time, and if you’re not a truly great director, you just can’t hide."

— From Matt Damon’s interview with GQ (December 2011).

[Ben]’s made three fantastic movies, one better than the next. And one thing I’ve learned is that you cannot make a great movie by accident. Anybody who makes a great movie is a great director. Period. That’s true. Because the director is responsible for literally everything. Everything. The framing of the shot; where the camera is; what the actors are wearing; the color of the walls; the color of the drapes; the color of the scarf around the leading lady’s neck; the way she says that line. Everything. It’s all manipulated. Every single decision. These directors are making hundreds and hundreds of decisions a day, over hundreds of days. You just can’t do it by accident. It’s literally impossible.

— Matt Damon presents Ben Affleck with the Santa Barbara International Film Festival Modern Master Award (February 2013).

Directing saved Ben's career. He was forced to take complete control of his creative output, but when he did, his merit was finally recognized. I find it interesting that almost four decades into his acting career, Matt has yet to step fully into this role, despite various tentative approaches through the years.

Then Damon will direct himself. Beginning sometime in early 2012, he is going into preproduction on an as-yet-untitled movie he’s writing with John Krasinski, of The Office. [...] “I just found writing with him really easy—like writing with Ben,” Damon says.

— From Matt Damon’s interview with GQ (December 2011).

As to the actor’s long-held plans to direct, they’re some time from happening, especially while he is back at the peak of his acting career with Martian and the new Bourne. “I have to find the time,” he says. “I have to find the right project that’s going to fit with my life.”

— From Matt Damon’s interview with The Hollywood Reporter (30 September 2015).

Somewhere along the way, he will eventually direct. He has come close twice but stepped aside. He was initially scheduled to direct Promised Land, a movie about fracking that he wrote with John Krasinski, and was also supposed to direct Manchester by the Sea, which was based on an idea Krasinski had proposed to him over dinner. But when Kenneth Lonergan subsequently tendered the script that they had commissioned, it was obvious to Damon that Lonergan should direct it instead. (He likes to joke that the best move he made as the movie’s producer was to fire himself as the movie’s director.) Most likely, though, more acting will come first. “I feel like I’ve been steadily improving at my job for a long time,” he says. “And that’s a great feeling.” He muses about how sometimes, for all one’s effort, movies may still misfire. “I really want people to care as much as I do about the things I’m putting out,” he says. “And, you know, some of them have really worked, and some of them really haven’t.”

— From Matt Damon's interview with GQ (8 September 2021).

Maybe it's like Ben said: Matt just has too many good opportunities offered to him as an actor, and directing would take up even more of the precious time he'd prefer spending with his family. Maybe he's already sufficiently satisfied with his creative output as an actor, writer, and producer that he doesn't feel the need to take on the director's chair. Maybe there's something about the weight of responsibility, those hundreds of decisions, how "if you’re not a truly great director, you just can’t hide," that have turned him off from fully committing to the role.

It makes it all the more compelling that one of the times he's been the most publicly enthusiastic about directing was so he could give Ben a safe haven as an actor:

MATT: The great thing is we have this little company together [Pearl Street Films]. And so now my partner in the company is the hottest director in Hollywood. […] I would love to be directed by him. I think that would be a lot of fun. And he’s clearly a fantastic director. And I’d love to direct him! You know? He was in actor jail for a while. I remember talking to him 10 years ago, when he was on the cover of those magazines every week. And no one knew more than him what a disaster it was. He said, “I’m in the worst place you can be. I sell magazines and not movie tickets.” And it was just a big hole and it just took him a decade, but he dug his way out. And I know what he wants is to work. He loves acting! And he’s at his best when he trusts the director. He wants some directors that he can trust to work with. So I’d love to direct him in something. And now I’m sure his performance in The Town and then his performance in Argo are so good that now the big directors I think are starting to call and want to hire him, just as an actor.

— Matt Damon Career Retrospective in SAG-AFTRA Foundation Conversations, moderated by Jenelle Riley (6 December 2012).

Like, I have to reiterate this: Matt loves Ben so much that he was willing to make his directorial debut — something that, for some reason or another, he has avoided doing for his entire career — just so he could create a safe space for Ben to act; to give him someone he trusts in the big chair, so Ben can also do the front-of-the-camera work he loves.

Which brings me back to Ben and his directorial style. What always strikes me when I hear Ben talk about directing is the extent of his openness, his generosity. For someone who had a string of bad experiences when he was powerless, I find it remarkable that once he stepped into a leadership position, Ben did not close ranks and tried to defensively control everything around him. Instead, he humbly recognized his own shortcomings and actively welcomed everyone's contributions. Ben's whole ethos is embracing the collaborative spirit at the heart of filmmaking and sees his role as a director to create an environment that facilitates others' creative output. Here are Ben and Casey talking about it after Ben's directorial debut with Gone Girl:

“One of the things Ben does as a director is listen to other people’s ideas and take the best and leave the rest. He’s not territorial, a mistake I’ve seen other directors make, I guess, because they feel insecure about their position. Ben let them try their ideas, which makes them feel like their ideas are on the line. They invest more. But he’s pretty discerning. Including some of my bad ideas, where he would go, like, I’m not going to do that.” Ben interrupts. “In terms of directing Casey it was just providing him with the best opportunity he could to succeed.” Here he accelerates. “Doing whatever that took, creating that environment for Casey and whatever that meant, and keeping out whatever I had to keep out … ” He’s talking even faster. “ … and allowing Casey to make whatever choices he wanted to make and, if he had an idea or instinct or experiment he wanted to try, doing what I could to let him try that, even if that meant holding off 10 other people who were going, ‘What? No! We’re not doing that!’ That to me is directing.”

— Ben and Casey Affleck’s interview with The Washington Post (17 October 2007).

I believe it's this same spirit that is at the root of the creative partnership between Ben and Matt. I find it endearing how certain things Ben says stick with Matt; how he goes on to repeat them like gospel. Like the story of how Matt was stumped about where to go with Good Will Hunting's prototype script, so he brought it to Ben, who replied, "I don't know what to do with it either, but let's do it together." And how, when they started working on it, Ben asked Matt "not to judge him for how bad his bad ideas are, but how good his good ideas are." There's an amount of vulnerability, sincerity, and trust in these two anecdotes that paints a pretty clear picture of why these two have remained close friends and partners for the overwhelming majority of their lives.

Another point of interest to me is why, then, did it take so long not only for Matt and Ben to work together again, but specifically for Ben to direct Matt. Especially since this was something Matt expressed clear interest in all the way back in 2012, when they started Pearl Street Films (Artists Equity's predecessor). There were even concrete plans in place:

Meanwhile Damon and Ben Affleck, the man he calls his “hetero lifemate,” remain as tight as ever. The two have a production company, Pearl Street Films, and Damon lets slip that they are developing a biopic about James “Whitey” Bulger, the onetime godfather of the Irish Mob in Boston, who was on the lam for sixteen years before being apprehended last June. Damon will play Bulger and Affleck will direct. But that won’t be for a while yet.

— From Matt Damon’s interview with GQ (December 2011).

The project was ultimately dropped when Black Mass came out:

The friends came close to reteaming on a biopic about Boston criminal Whitey Bulger, but they got beaten to the punch by Johnny Depp‘s Bulger film Black Mass. “We had a very different take on it,” says Damon, noting he has not yet seen the Depp movie, though he has read the book by Dick Lehr and Gerard K. O’Neill on which it is based. Explaining the difference between the projects, he cites a letter he received from a South Boston author. “It was a really moving letter that basically said: ‘Don’t glorify this man any more. Please stop.’ And this is to take nothing away from Black Mass. I hear the movie’s great. But Ben and I agreed with the guy who’d written us. And so we came up with this idea of doing it more like an anti-gangster movie. Make it look like what it was: something grotesque.”

— From Matt Damon’s interview with The Hollywood Reporter (30 September 2015).

It might have been that no other good opportunities came along in the decade that separated this project and Air. A lot of things have to align just right for such projects to come to fruition. That's why the Get Back Epiphany™ is so moving to me. Matt and Ben made the clear choice to take further control over their lives and careers and prioritize the things that made them happy: spending as much time together as possible, engaging in the creative collaboration that brought them here in the first place.

I'm going to wrap this up by saying that somehow, even with all my ramblings, I haven't managed to plow the depths of my fascination with the various aspects of their partnership. Or express all the thoughts that this short interview segment inspired in me. But I'll cut it off here by reiterating that it brings me immeasurable joy to be able to witness a partnership such as theirs in real time. Long may they share our screens and our lives!

[clockoftheheart]

thank you journalism

[kassadiee]

and i will not think about the fact that the situation between holden, alyssa, and banky neatly parallels ben, jen lopez, and matt irl. i won't bc i would sound insane and chronically online and jobless.

[ihavechuckie]

FRANK DISCUSSION WITH BEN AFFLECK by Mike McCarthy

Estimated date: April 1997

Actor Ben Affleck recently held court (press day, that is) in Boston to promote Kevin Smith's new film Chasing Amy, in which he stars as Holden, the guy who falls for a lesbian. You may recall his performance as the guy who looked "like a date rapist" in Smith's last film Mallrats. Or maybe you recall seeing him in Dazed and Confused or School Ties? Truth be told, it doesn't matter. His performance in Chasing Amy is quite the antithesis of his work thus far. Certainly took me by surprise, though not as much as his passion for Boston, which, it turns out, is his hometown. Sort of. "Well, I wasn't actually born here, to be perfectly honest," he admits, "but I moved here when I was three. I grew up in Central Square in Cambridge. Went to the public schools there." And his family? "My brother now lives in New York City. He goes to Columbia. My mother is a teacher in Cambridge, teaches 6th grade. My father was an auto mechanic at Autotorium and a bartender and such. Now, he lives in California working at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center writing grant proposals and counseling people."

MM: Had you known Kevin Smith prior to working with him, being fellow New Englanders?

BA: No, I met him on Mallrats. One of the casting directors also cast Dazed and Confused. I didn't want to do any more bad guys because I started getting all those scripts. I'd go, well, I'd like to play this role, but [they'd respond with] we're really interested in you for Bart, the school bully. I thought it was so boring. But, I really liked Clerks and the screenplay of Mallrats, believe it or not, depending on what you think of the movie. It was actually uproariously funny. I really wanted to do it. I didn't want to play that part, but the Dazed guys were like, look, if you come in you can basically be in the movie if you'll play this part. So, I figured, all right, it'll be working with Kevin. At the time I was interested in finding out how to make movies cheap and I figured who better to talk to then the guy whose last movie cost 27 thousand dollars. So, I did it and ended up becoming friends with him. He called me up and said, hey, I'm writing this movie about a guy who falls in love with this woman who's gay and I want you to play the guy. I said, well, I'd love to. He sent it to me as he was writing it. It was really nice to be involved from the beginning, for somebody to put that much faith in me.

MM: Did it put a lot of extra pressure on you knowing that Kevin wrote the part for you?

BA: Yeah, in a certain sense. It's a personal story. He obviously cared about it quite a bit and you want to honor that. I wanted him to be really happy with my work so he wouldn't feel like he made a colossal mistake in asking me to do his movie.

Something that could be putting pressure on Ben right now, and could perhaps even make him feel as though he made a mistake in doing the film, is the sexuality of Chasing Amy, depending on how the public perceives it. "So far, I've done five or six screenings. They were skewed toward younger audiences, but they had some older folks there. They have gone better than I could have possibly imagined," he says. "It really surprised how much people seem to love the movie. The sexuality is . . . frightening. The frank discussion and unusual sexual situations take people by surprise and freak them out. I hope we can come down on the side of people who find the movie funny, and kind of moving in itself, but for whom there's the additional appeal of getting to see how people who live a different lifestyle live. Even if that's a voyeuristic kind of experience, I'll take it."

Still, you have to wonder, does he worry that some people won't take it? "It may alienate some people," he admits. "My mother's best friend said she felt generationally challenged. This is not a movie I would particularly want my grandparents to see. The irony is that nobody has sex on camera and nobody gets killed. You have a movie with people talking the entire time. Yet, there's definitely a segment of the population that will find it just . . . bothersome.

Are there really so many idiots out there who can't see a lesbian in a movie without having a hard on? [Laughs] I mean, Ellen Degeneres is gonna come out as a lesbian on a big prime time TV show. And anyone who didn't know she was a lesbian before had their head in the sand."

MM: I wonder how the average male Kevin Smith fan will react to the proposed resolution to the whole situation?

BA: I've noticed it makes people nervous to watch it. It challenges the notions these people previously had in their mind, who they were. I consider anyone who's seen Mallrats a rabid Kevin Smith fan [Laughs]--they really like it. While they're seized with a little bit of sickness, they're interested in following through, really paying close attention. Put it this way: I've been impressed by people's open-mindedness and willingness to take the movie for what it is, which is a pretty honest, interesting story that feels a lot like real life in its complexity, open ending, roughness and rawness.

A conversation between Ben and another member of the press (an older woman):

Q: When [Silent Bob] is explaining Amy in the restaurant the gentleman beside him is eating sugar. That distracted me. BA: Yeah, he was eating spoonfuls of sugar. Q: That bothered me. Why is he upstaging? BA: He did upstage it. That's because the director was looking the other way. [Laughs] I don't know if he had singles on it or if it had coverage. Q: Was he really eating sugar? BA: Yeah, he was eating sugar. I was sitting right there. He's a weird cat. I don't really know what to tell you, besides that he eats spoonfuls of sugar. Gave him something to do in the scene, I guess. It is kind of nasty. I said, wow, that's a lot of refined sugar. Q: I'm distracted. During the important scene, he's explaining what Amy means to him, and this guy's eating sugar. I'm distracted. BA: Well, you're right to be so and I'm going to pass that on to Kevin and raise some cain.

MM: The only thing that distracted me was in the beginning, at the comic book convention, Jason Lee is yelling like he did throughout Mallrats. After a while, he tones it down and I can see him as Banky, but during the first 10 minutes he seemed more like Brodie with a beard.

BA: That's an interesting point. I think that, while the characters are different, that's an archetype that Kevin's used in all three of his films. The Dante/Randal dynamic. That straight guy/more outrageous guy thing seems to be a format that he's quite comfortable with. Jason Lee played that character in both those movies. So, certainly there's going to be some commonality. Though I think Jason showed a tremendous amount of nuance and range over the course of the movie. Kind of subtle stuff, you know? Obviously, a lot of the stuff he did was big, but there were a lot of subtle things in there that I noticed after watching it five or six times.

MM: Was that convention scene filmed first by any chance?

BA: It wasn't the first scene shot, but I think that scene called for a bigger performance because he was supposed to lose it about being a tracer. Initially, it wasn't supposed to be the first scene in the movie. There was another sequence that took place before that which got cut out.

At one point an openly gay critic points out that, "Some gay people will be like oh, no, another gay character getting together with a straight character."

Ben jokes, "Another? What was the other one?"

After the laughs pass, Ben adds, "I talked to a guy who writes for a gay magazine. He said what he personally liked about the movie was that it wasn't necessarily a gay positive movie. Often when you're making a movie about gay people it's like they have to be put on a pedestal. He said he felt this movie included gay characters at face value. In other words, they were who they were. It was an attempt to write honest characters, be they gay, straight, or, as Kevin seems to be suggesting, that their sexuality--their orientation--exists along a spectrum. If 10 is totally gay and one is totally straight, you have characters who are sprinkled along this gamut, which I thought was an interesting theory."

So, is Alyssa really a lesbian? "Whether or not she is clearly a lesbian or clearly bisexual, she doesn't fit easily into any label. She's just a person who has had relationships with a bunch of different people, who had made a choice in one point to live her lifestyle one way then kind of reconsiders and rationalizes. To me, from a purely objective point of view, someone who sleeps with both men and women is defined as bisexual. But, if a woman says I'm a lesbian, I'm gay, regardless of whether or not she has slept with men in the past, one has to respect that.

At one point I'm saying why are you with me and she's saying, I didn't want to halve my options. I'm looking for this one person who's my soulmate, who completes me, who I want to spend my life with. Her personal rational--not the rational of all lesbians or all people--is that by saying I can only take this person from one group of people is limiting. That's her theory. I think it's pretty clear that to say all a woman really needs is a good man is offensive and certainly silly. This movie articulates that sentiment and puts it in the mouth of its most buffoonish character, who's the brunt of all the jokes. Of course Kevin's not trying to suggest that.

I really like the character Dwight plays--Hooper. The really great thing is he's a character first, sexual orientation second. His orientation doesn't dictate his behavior. It simply exists and it doesn't upstage anything in the story. He's part of this group of people and they're all friends who hang out. It's not made to feel cutesy or waved around. Personally, I like that. And, ultimately, I think the medium of cinema is too small to ever try to speak for all people of any sexual orientation or anything else.

If you're gonna make movies that are predictable and about things you could expect, why make the movie? The whole point of making a movie is that things happen that you wouldn't necessarily imagine. People say things that take you by surprise. People do things that create situations where there's a lot of conflict."

On the flipside of surprises and conflicts would have to be predictability and resolutions. That said, what are Ben's thoughts on the film's open ending? Where does he think the characters end up? "I like that it's left to your interpretation. My interpretation is that when you have a friend you're that close to and you have something really traumatic break that it leaves a rip," he explains. "After the course of a year, Holden is left with a lot of warm feelings toward Banky and picks up his comic, which I think is a sweet moment. Especially since they were partners in their art and they'd both gone on to pursue separate projects artistically, which is a pretty significant kind of break up. I think after a ripped break like that it's almost more uncomfortable to try to be friends again because you're very aware of what's not there in a relationship.

This ties into one of the things Kevin's talking about, which is rather than saying that Banky is gay, or that anybody is gay, the idea is that often close male relationships operate quite a bit like love relationships in a lot of ways. You care about one another very deeply. You're loyal to one another. You spend a lot of time together. You can be jealous if some woman comes in and takes your friend away. Ultimately, it's about how you care about other people in your life, not necessarily who you sleep with. I don't really see Holden spending a tremendous amount of time with either Banky or Alyssa in the future. I think of him spending some time with himself, writing his Chasing Amy comic and living by himself. That's why I like that shot in the end where he goes out the door. He's gonna see what it's like to be a little more independent in the world. Grow up a little bit, I think."

It's clear that Ben has put a great deal of thought into Chasing Amy, not just in terms of his own performance, but in regards to the film as a whole. No doubt he's given it the sort of thought only writers and directors generally give their films. That said, it isn't surprising that he recently co-wrote a film with fellow actor Matt Damon (who has a cameo in Chasing Amy). The two will star in the film, entitled Good Will Hunting, along with Robin Williams under the direction of Gus Van Sant.

Should we expect something of the, well, offbeat variety? "There are parts of it that are a little offbeat. It's not as edgy, and certainly less profane, than Chasing Amy," Ben states, adding, "It's a different movie, yet it's also a coming of age story with a very classic structure in that sense. What's different and unusual about it is that it's geographically specific to the environment of Boston and the culture here. Everything from the dialect to the particular way that people live their lives that's different from other cities in the country. We want that to come through to the audience because we grew up here, Matt and I. He and I grew up two blocks apart, right out of Central Square. Right down Pearl Street. And we've never felt as though the city has been done well. It wasn't the way we perceived it growing up here. It always rang false. Everything down to some kind of weird, bastardized Kennedy accent. It's not a city of leprechauns, you know what I mean?"

Indeed I do, but does Gus Van Sant? After all, he certainly has a unique signature. Is Ben afraid Good Will Hunting will come out looking more like Gus Van Sant's world as opposed to true life Boston? "I hope that Gus' signature and sensibility will be on this movie because I think he's an excellent filmmaker," he says. "I also know Gus is really invested in making a movie about Boston. It was Gus' idea to hold a huge audition for non-actors, people who are really from Boston. He definitely wants an authentic sense of the city, not a false, glossed over sort of version of what it's like here. That would be a real underachievement. So, in that sense, hopefully we get the best of both worlds. We get Boston and we also get Gus, who lends a more mature, seasoned eye to the whole thing than either Matt or I could offer."

Were Robin Williams not in the cast one might just assume Good Will Hunting will be made on a low budget. However, as Ben points out, "It's hard to make a low budget movie when you have Robin Williams and Gus Van Sant. Those guys definitely took substantial pay cuts. But, then your production costs all of a sudden go up, ironically. People say, who are you trying to fool, I'm not gonna give you a deal, you've got Robin Williams in your movie! It's hard to go in and say can you cut your rate to the boom guy or the caterer. They say, cut my rate? If I can't make my rate on a Robin Williams movie where can I make my rate? Those costs add up. So, while it certainly isn't a low budget movie, it's certainly low by big studio budget movie standards."

MM: Did you consult with Kevin Smith when you were writing the script?

BA: Not really, although it's because of Kevin we're at Miramax, which is why he has a co-executive producer credit. We were running into trouble with another studio because they wanted to shoot it in Toronto, among other things. We said, this is the most geographically specific movie that's ever been made. Shooting this is Toronto would be ruinous. And they talked about the rates. Boston has an extremely bad reputation in LA, because of the Teamsters and some things that happened in the 70s. I'm not bashing the unions by any means, but it's not about people showing up and you get to charge them what you want. It's about you having to bring your rate to a point where you can attract people, where you're competitive. I think the perspective is, these people have money and they just don't want to pay us. Well, yeah, they have money and, yeah, they don't want to pay you, but if you ask for too much money they're not gonna give it to you--they'll go to somebody else who doesn't ask for as much. And those people are the Canadians. And there's no reason why Toronto should have 20 or 30 films in production at any given time. Boston is an infinitely more interesting city with a tremendous amount of character. I worked on School Ties for four months and it went well. And I know a lot of the Teamsters here. That's not the problem. It's just a matter of perception. And, in all fairness, the fact that the Canadians have the exchange rate in their favor, which is about 25 cents on the dollar. Also, Canada gives a very significant tax break to movie studios that go up there. On a federal level, they pursue actively the business of attracting filmmakers.

MM: What percentage of Good Will Hunting will be filmed in Boston?

BA: We're getting all the exteriors here. What Matt and I want to do, because we have this deal with Miramax, is demonstrate that you can make a movie in Boston and it doesn't cost you a lot of money.

MM: It will help if Brass Ring (which recently shot in Boston) does well.

BA: Yeah, they just wrapped. They had a low budget agreement, which is good, that they'll make low budget agreements with those movies. I think they were very helpful with those guys. A couple of my friends were in that movie. They came in under budget and such. And if you can spend a million and a half I don't see what the problem is with shooting in Boston. I'm sure that's cheaper than Canada. But, anyway, I'm just stuck on this idea. I'd like to convince the studios to come back here for larger budget stuff. I find it interesting. It's also my home, where I grew up. I certainly know this city better than any other city. So, it makes sense for me to want to make movies here. That's why it's so disheartening to find so much resistance. Let me tell you, if it weren't for Matt and I basically getting to the point where we said, we will quit if you guys don't agree to shoot in Boston, as opposed to Toronto, it wouldn't be here. At all. That's why we left Castle Rock. We said, forget it, we'd rather just not do the movie. That's what it takes. Miramax fought it, but then they, to their credit, understood that and why we cared about it. And, even so, we only get to do half of it here.

Further thoughts on Miramax and the Weinstein brothers? "I think the Weinstein brothers demonstrated to the market that independent, low budget movies were profitable, potentially. That if you could keep your costs down you could make money producing them as well as acquiring and distributing them. The first thing they did was acquire and distribute these movies and demonstrate that people would pay some money. They paid small money to acquire the movies and they'd spend advertising money, but in local market places. People came to the movies and they made money. Slowly, the larger machinery of Hollywood has begun to recognize that, which is why you see Sony Pictures Classics, Fine Line and Fox Searchlight, these indy shingles on the hat of the Warner Brothers kind of castle. Harvey and Bob have demonstrated that if Adam Smith were around today he'd be financing low budget, interesting independent movies. It's simply good venture capitalism, really. In addition, I really do believe those guys care about movies and making good movies, which is not necessarily the rule in Hollywood."

That's for sure. In fact, it has reached a point that some feel there's a deliberate, consolidated movement of young actors, producers, directors and writers in the independent film world. Would Ben agree? "Yeah, I do. To a certain extent," he says, explaining, "It looks a little more like that from the outside. It's still acting and getting your movie made. It's still very much about opportunity and trying to get the opportunity. Actors who do independent movies are still auditioning. You still have to scrap to get your movie made. But, there's definitely a group of people who have in common the fact that they essentially came out of the independent film market. People who became successful via that route, rather than the studio."

Any further thoughts on the independent route? "In a way, the independent route is more director driven than studio movies," he point out. "Usually when you hit studio movies people don't talk about directors as much. The independent movies seem to be more about filmmakers. In a way, less about actors, actually. There are a lot of good actors in independent films, but it takes people three or four movies to catch up and go, yeah, he was good in that, too."

Hmm. Could this mean people are about to catch up and start taking note of Ben's talent with Chasing Amy? Indeed.

[mattnben-bennmatt]

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon: Faces of the Oscars

They successfully turned a high-tech thriller into a tearjerker, and struck a box office heart of gold — but the real payoff may come on Oscar night

By Rebecca Ascher-Walsh for Entertainment Weekly (13 February 1998)

[NOTE: The full transcript of the article, as retrieved from the Entertainment Weekly website, is under the cut. It does seem surprisingly short to me, so I don't know if it is in its complete form as presented in the original issue. If anyone has any information on this, it would be most welcome!]

Good Will Hunting

Math prodigy Will Hunting, on a job interview with NASA, is given a test code to crack. He quickly spots an evil scheme: NASA and the FBI have set him up with a real code, which, once solved, could cause mass destruction. Hunting recruits his best friends and understanding shrink to hatch a plan, beat the government, and save the day.

This is not, most certainly, the subtle, warm-the-cockles-of-your-heart Good Will Hunting that has propelled cowriters, actors, and childhood best friends Matt Damon and Ben Affleck onto Hollywood’s most-wanted list, into the hearts of American audiences, and toward the Oscar podium. And the tortuous path Affleck and Damon were forced to navigate in order to transform the movie from a high-tech conspiracy thriller to an intimate character study is one of the most dramatic stories of the Oscar season.

After five years of knocking, Damon, 27, and Affleck, 25, have been admitted to the Movie Hall of Fame so suddenly that it’s a little disconcerting. A few weeks ago, an 80-year-old woman walked past the Manhattan set of Miramax’s Rounders, in which Damon plays a card shark, and — upon learning who the star was — exclaimed in wonder, “Matt Damon, the sex symbol?!” And when Affleck — in L.A. to film the summer blockbuster-in-waiting Armageddon with Bruce Willis — went to the Disney cafeteria and signed for his lunch because he’d forgotten his wallet, he learned the next day on a television gossip show that he had, in fact, pitched a fit and demanded a free meal. “It worried me,” Affleck says. “I haven’t trashed a hotel room yet, but yesterday I leaned back in my chair at the Four Seasons and it kind of snapped. What will they think?”

What they’ll think is that Good Will Hunting‘s odyssey is a classic Hollywood-in-the-’90s Cinderella story, the kind that ends with the prospect of Academy Awards and surprisingly good box office. Which isn’t far from the truth, if the evil stepmother becomes a studio, and Prince Charming is redrawn to look like (gulp) Harvey Weinstein.

Affleck — who refers to his partner and himself as “the Milli Vanilli of screenwriters” — and Damon began to work on Good Will Hunting in 1993, basing the story on a one-act play Damon had written at Harvard (he left before completing his studies). They drew from their own life growing up in Boston, where they were introduced by their mothers, both teachers, 17 years ago. “We’re pretty inseparable, in terms of our experiences,” Damon says. “We look at things in exactly the same way.” While they wrote, Damon says, “it wasn’t like someone was good at structure and someone at dialogue. The only difference between us is Ben can type.”

Neither, however, can edit. “We must have written 1,500 pages,” Damon says. “We had Will Goes to the Zoo episodes.” Within months, they settled on a script combining a friendship adventure with a “banana in the tailpipe” plot, as Affleck described the then-thrill-a-minute NASA caper. The characters of Will (Damon), a down-and-out boy genius, and his best friend Chuckie (Affleck), a construction worker, were already in place. But instead of the mentor/professor eventually played by Stellan Skarsgard, imagine a nefarious FBI agent attempting to corrupt Will, and instead of boy-meets-therapist bonding, picture a climax with world peace at stake.

That may have been a tall order for what Damon and Affleck envisioned as an independently financed $2 million project — and in November 1994, when Castle Rock won a bidding war for the script, director Rob Reiner, a partner in the studio, told them to drop the adventure angle and focus on the relationships. “It was a scary moment,” says coproducer Chris Moore. “We started [all over again] with 63 pages and made it a character story.”

[ihavechuckie]

Full Article！

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon: Faces of the Oscars

They successfully turned a high-tech thriller into a tearjerker, and struck a box office heart of gold--but the real payoff may come on Oscar night

By Rebecca Ascher-Walsh for Entertainment Weekly (13 February 1998)

MATH PRODIGY WILL HUNTING, ON A JOB interview with NASA, is given a test code to crack. He quickly spots an evil scheme: NASA and the FBI have set him up with a real code, which, once solved, could cause mass destruction. Hunting recruits his best friends and understanding shrink to hatch a plan, beat the government, and save the day.

This is not, most certainly, the subtle, warm-the-cockles-of-your-heart Good Will Hunting that has propelled cowriters, actors, and childhood best friends Matt Damon and Ben Affleck onto Hollywood's most-wanted list, into the hearts of American audiences, and toward the Oscar podium. And the tortuous path Affleck and Damon were forced to navigate in order to transform the movie from a high-tech conspiracy thriller to an intimate character study is one of the most dramatic stories of the Oscar season.

After five years of knocking, Damon, 27, and Affleck, 25, have been admitted to the Movie Hall of Fame so suddenly that it's a little disconcerting. A few weeks ago, an 80-year-old woman walked past the Manhattan set of Miramax's Rounders, in which Damon plays a card shark, and--upon learning who the star was--exclaimed in wonder, "Matt Damon, the sex symbol?!" And when Affleck--in L.A. to film the summer blockbuster-in-waiting Armageddon with Bruce Willis--went to the Disney cafeteria and signed for his lunch because he'd forgotten his wallet, he learned the next day on a television gossip show that he had, in fact, pitched a fit and demanded a free meal. "It worried me," Affleck says. "I haven't trashed a hotel room yet, but yesterday I leaned back in my chair at the Four Seasons and it kind of snapped. What will they think?"

What they'll think is that Good Will Hunting's odyssey is a classic Hollywood-in-the-'90s Cinderella story, the kind that ends with the prospect of Academy Awards and surprisingly good box office. Which isn't far from the truth, if the evil stepmother becomes a studio, and Prince Charming is redrawn to look like (gulp) Harvey Weinstein.

Affleck--who refers to his partner and himself as "the Milli Vanilli of screenwriters"--and Damon began to work on Good Will Hunting in 1993, basing the story on a one-act play Damon had written at Harvard (he left before completing his studies). They drew from their own life growing up in Boston, where they were introduced by their mothers, both teachers, 17 years ago. "We're pretty inseparable, in terms of our experiences," Damon says. "We look at things in exactly the same way." While they wrote, Damon says, "it wasn't like someone was good at structure and someone at dialogue. The only difference between us is Ben can type."

Neither, however, can edit. "We must have written 1,500 pages," Damon says. "We had Will Goes to the Zoo episodes." Within months, they settled on a script combining a friendship adventure with a "banana in the tailpipe" plot, as Affleck described the then-thrill-a-minute NASA caper. The characters of Will (Damon), a down-and-out boy genius, and his best friend Chuckie (Affleck), a construction worker, were already in place. But instead of the mentor/professor eventually played by Stellan Skarsgård, imagine a nefarious FBI agent attempting to corrupt Will, and instead of boy-meets-therapist bonding, picture a climax with world peace at stake.

That may have been a tall order for what Damon and Affleck envisioned as an independently financed $2 million project--and in November 1994, when Castle Rock won a bidding war for the script, director Rob Reiner, a partner in the studio, told them to drop the adventure angle and focus on the relationships. "It was a scary moment," says coproducer Chris Moore. "We started [all over again] with 63 pages and made it a character story."

"It was a very passionate debate," says Affleck, "and we left a little deflated. But after listening to [Reiner], we had to concede." The partners locked themselves in a room, where, says Affleck, "we went on to write scenes that were so absurd." In one draft, Will's therapist, Sean, became Will's construction foreman; Will and Sean bonded when Will tagged along to Sean's book club meeting. In another version, "Chuckie died, squashed by a steel beam," Affleck says. "No idea seemed too bad to pursue. We would have done Boogie Nights if we'd thought of it: Sean is a pornographer!"

After a year of rewrites, Damon and Affleck settled on the script that would eventually become Good Will Hunting. But when they returned to Castle Rock in October 1995, they hit an impasse: The studio demanded that another of its partners, Andrew Scheinman (whose only directorial experience was the flop Little Big League), helm the film. "It was certainly a big issue," admits Castle Rock partner Martin Shafer, "but there were a couple of other creative issues as well." Shafer says Castle Rock generously gave Hunting back to the filmmakers, something "we didn't have to do."

Affleck says, however, that he and Damon were given 30 days to sell Hunting to another studio and reimburse Castle Rock's development costs. (He charges that the studio "significantly bloated" the tab, which Shafer denies.) If they failed, the film would return to Castle Rock. "I was told [by Castle Rock reps] if we couldn't get another offer for the script, we'd be lucky to get tickets to the premiere," Affleck adds.

Whatever suspense they'd dropped from their script seemed to be coming back at them, because the studios that initially expressed enthusiasm for Hunting now passed. "It was twice as expensive as when it first went out," says Affleck. "It had the curse of being in turnaround, and [we] now had a reputation for being difficult." After going to meetings that Affleck felt were held "just so people could say no to us after we passed on them a year earlier," Damon headed off to film Courage Under Fire, and Affleck to make Kevin Smith's Chasing Amy. With three days left before Castle Rock's deadline, a despairing Affleck persuaded director Smith to take a look at the script. After reading it overnight--"He said it made him cry on the toilet," Affleck remembers--Smith showed it to Miramax cochairman Harvey Weinstein, who immediately bought the project for nearly $1 million. "The reader at Miramax had passed," says Damon. "I don't think he works there anymore."

By the time the more-talk, less-action Good Will was ready to roll last spring, Damon and Affleck had given Will a Harvard premed-student girlfriend named Skylar (based on Damon's similarly named premed girlfriend at Harvard and played by Minnie Driver) and a gifted therapist (Robin Williams, whose agreement to play the part was crucial to Miramax's greenlight). The signing of Williams also made it easier for the studio to okay Affleck and Damon's directorial choice, Gus Van Sant, better known for edgy material like Drugstore Cowboy. Williams, for his part, had great confidence in the script--until his first meeting with Damon and Affleck. "I walked in and thought, 'When are your fathers getting here?' "

DAMON AND AFFLECK NO LONGER WANT FOR WORK, but they've had little time to savor being, as Affleck says, "on top of the pyramid." Damon has filmed three movies back-to-back (he went from Hunting to Steven Spielberg's World War II epic Saving Private Ryan, due in June, to Rounders), and hasn't "had any downtime to process what's going on, and where I am." Or to enjoy it: His sole treat to himself, he says sheepishly, was purchasing a $10 scarf during a stroll through Manhattan's Greenwich Village. "It was a big purchase," he says. "I mean it. I always bought a winter jacket for myself after each movie, but now people give me clothes, so it would be wasteful to buy myself one."

These days, Damon and Affleck's snazzier public images are largely thanks to the free designer tuxedos they received to pick up their Golden Globes for best screenplay, and the beautiful women on their arms. (Affleck is dating Gwyneth Paltrow, and in a too-cute-for-words twist, Damon--who recently parted company with Hunting costar Driver--has been seen with Paltrow's close friend Winona Ryder.)

In March, he and Affleck begin filming Kevin Smith's Dogma in Pittsburgh; then they'll head to Europe, Damon to play a cultured killer in Anthony Minghella's The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Affleck to costar with Paltrow in the romance Shakespeare in Love. Along the way, they say, they'll cowrite (via fax) their next film, Halfway House, about a pair of Boston drug-abuse counselors; Castle Rock, which retained rights to their next effort, will produce. "It's sort of a low-concept stepchild of Good Will Hunting," Damon says. "We've got 150 pages, and about 5 are good." In addition, they have a two-picture Miramax deal that includes writing and starring in a buddy comedy.

Also tentatively on the schedule is a quick March 23 jaunt to L.A., where, say oddsmakers, Damon has a good shot at a Best Actor nomination, Affleck a small one for Best Supporting Actor, and both an extremely strong one for Best Original Screenplay. "I can't even...I mean..." Damon stutters. "Ben and I haven't talked about it all. Truly. I think it's because in some deep place we really want to find out we got nominated." For what? "That's a hard one," he says. "Neither of us really long to be screenwriters, but at the same time, that would be a category in which we'd be nominated together. I don't care if we were nominated for Best Morons, because I'd think, Well, I got nominated with Ben, and that's pretty cool.... If you put us together, you might actually make a whole, creative, interesting individual. We're a lot like the Wonder Twins.

"I'll never forget the first time we saw the movie at the premiere," Damon continues, "looking at the faces of the people who were behind this movie. I'm very aware of who was there when I needed them, when I was completely powerless and begging. Believe me, we know every single person who was behind this movie, and every single person who wasn't."

[magneticghouls]

i thought damn. i wish there were more mattfleck + text posts out there. then i realized i could just do it myself.

[makingshport]

Damn just saw a video of Matt Damon move close and take a drag of Ben Afflecks cigarette and that old man yaoi really does hit different

[makingshport]

Damn just saw a video of Matt Damon move close and take a drag of Ben Afflecks cigarette and that old man yaoi really does hit different