Ben Affleck is showering Matt Damon with praise for helping him achieve happiness in his career again. In an intimate January interview with Damon hosted via Entertainment Weekly, Affleck said of Damon sweetly, “I don’t know that that would’ve been possible for me alone, doing this job in this world without somebody I grew up with who I loved, who I knew loved me … and whom the popularity of my movies or what people said about me wasn’t going to change what they thought about me.”
In addition to his general support, Affleck revealed that Damon was a “principal influence” in his decision to only work on what makes him happy. “I want to do the things that would bring me joy,” said Affleck. The two discussed Affleck’s role in Ridley Scott’s 2021 “The Last Duel,” in which Damon also stars and co-wrote with Affleck. In spite of the film being deemed a box office bomb (via Variety), Affleck maintained, “I had fun every day on this movie. I wasn’t the star, I wasn’t likable. I was a villain. I wasn’t all the things I thought I was supposed to be when I started out, and yet it was a wonderful experience. And it was all just stuff that came along that I wasn’t chasing.” Affleck’s newfound approach is working, receiving a SAG nomination for Best Supporting Actor in December 2021’s George Clooney-directed film, “The Tender Bar.”
