“I just thought I should quit”: One movie sent Ben Affleck into Hollywood exile and saved his career
Ben Affleck is an Oscar-winning writer, a brilliant director, and a pretty decent actor, but he’s even more fascinating as a celebrity who has gone through multiple stages of success, failure, and revitalisation.
While his childhood best friend and Good Will Hunting co-writer, Matt Damon, had a much more consistent arc to his career, Affleck’s viability has fluctuated wildly in the public eye. He had earned the chance to graduate beyond being Damon’s co-star when he headlined the blockbuster Armageddon, which became the highest-grossing film of 1988, but he was hit with a series of misfires that tanked his commercial appeal, including the infamous disaster that is Gigli.
Although the film is credited with being one of the worst mainstream films ever released by Hollywood, Affleck cited two other titles as being the crushing blows that nearly led him to quit the industry entirely, when 2004 saw the release of the romantic comedy Jersey Girl and the science fiction action mystery Paycheck.
On paper, both films seemed like good choices: Paycheck was an ambitious sci-fi thriller based on a story by the legendary writer Philip K Dick, and was directed by the brilliant Asian filmmaker John Woo, while Jersey Girl was a romantic comedy that reunited Affleck with writer/director Kevin Smith, who had previously cast him in Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, and Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back, but unfortunately, both garnered nasty reviews from critics, many of whom singled out the actor as a major issue.
“I just thought I should quit acting,” Affleck said. “It was horrible to feel so suffocated. I thought, ‘I’d rather do something else than do this’”.
The first pearl in his string of failures was 2003’s Daredevil, the adaptation of the Marvel comic book in which he played the titular hero of Matt Murdock, and ironically, it would be another superhero-related project that would bring him out of exile, as Affleck agreed to play George Reeves in the biographical noir Hollywoodland. Reeves, best known for being Superman on television, died under mysterious circumstances, and the film questioned whether it was a suicide or murder, while also proving that Affleck was still a great actor, leading him to have more confidence as he selected his future projects.
“I did a lot of great movies in succession, but weirdly enough, and I think I was too sensitive, I felt nobody noticed,” he explained, “Other stuff got attention, and I didn’t get good reviews. I thought I would accomplish really good work, and people would say it was really good work, and I would feel validated, but that didn’t happen.”
It turned out that taking a step back to work behind-the-scenes was the smartest decision, as he made one of the most impressive directorial debuts of the 21st century with Gone Baby Gone, and although both that and his subsequent film The Town were successful, Affleck was properly crowned by Hollywood when his historical drama Argo won the Academy Award for ‘Best Picture’.
Affleck had to ultimately get another shot at redemption after playing Batman in the DC Extended Universe didn’t pan out in his favour; however, he is now looking to shape the future of the industry with his work alongside Damon on their new production company Artists Equity.
