Ben Affleck said in an interview with GQ magazine that his acting career started to differ from that of friend Matt Damon‘s after Damon made the “wise choice” early on to pick projects based on the movie’s director.
After 1997’s “Good Will Hunting” won them the Oscar for original screenplay, Damon joined forces with the likes of Steven Spielberg (“Saving Private Ryan”), Anthony Minghella (“Talented Mr. Ripley”), Robert Redford (“The Legend of Bagger Vance”), Steven Soderbergh (“Ocean’s Eleven”) and more. Affleck, meanwhile, leaned into action blockbusters like “Armageddon” and big studio fare such as “Pearl Harbor,” “Daredevil” and more.
“I thought you were going to compare our acting careers, to which I would’ve said, well, Matt learned and knew earlier than I did to really key in on the director as the fundamental basis on which he’s going to make a decision whether to do a movie or not, which was a very wise choice,” Affleck told GQ about where his acting career parted from Damon’s. “And also he has certainly had opportunities to do movies that like — it’s not like I was saying, ‘No, Scorsese, no, Spielberg, I’m not going to be in your movie.’ We’re in situations of our opportunities, and we’re subject to that”
“I would’ve taken ‘Saving Private Ryan,’” Affleck added later in the interview. “If Martin Scorsese called me and told me to play a waiter, I would take it. Steven Spielberg is one of the great filmmaking architects to ever live. I feel that way about Chris Nolan. I may go visit Matt on the set just to watch Nolan direct. I’m not even kidding at all.”
Damon is currently filming Christopher Nolan‘s “The Odyssey” in the lead role opposite a sprawling ensemble cast that includes Anne Hathaway, Zendaya, Tom Holland and more. It’s the third collaboration between Damon and Nolan following “Interstellar” and “Oppenheimer.”
“I was talking to Matt about—he’s going off to do this Chris Nolan movie and doing a lot of stunt rehearsal, and it was kind of like, ‘Boy, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?’” Affleck told GQ about his buddy going into action mode for Nolan. “You really have to go learn the fights. This is ‘Bourne Identity’ kind of territory.”
Affleck is also back in action mode in “The Accountant 2,” in theaters April 25. Despite making the sequel, the actor knows his stunt days are behind him.
“I used to be very gung ho about like, ‘Oh, I’ll do the fights, I’ll do the stunts.’ And now I am very much, ‘At what point is the stunt performer going to come in and do this?’” he said. “Part of it’s because I know they’re just better at it than I am, and you want somebody who looks good doing it. From a totally selfish perspective, you just get banged up and tired.”
Head over to GQ magazine’s website to read Affleck’s latest cover story in its entirety.
