Ben Affleck

Is there something about the Batman suit that, like, the low pitch, the growl comes? I mean, you have a deep voice anyway, but, like, every Batman has to do the, I'm Batman, like, that you can't help it. Is that just go with the territory? Because if you're like, I'm Batman, it just seems farcical, right? Like, that's not. I want to watch you bleed. Yeah, I'm going to watch you bleed. And I'm Batman. Get away from me. I'm Batman. Prepare your ears, humans. Happy, sad, confused begins now. Hey, guys, it's Josh. Welcome to Happy, Sad, Confused. Today on the show, Ben Affleck is here, one of the greats, a legend, a writer, a director, an Oscar winner. He's Batman, for God's sakes, and he has a new movie, Animals. We talk about all of it and much, much more. One of my favorite episodes, maybe of all time. I don't want to hype it up too much, guys, but this is a banger of an episode of Happy, Sad, Confused. Ben Affleck has been on the list for many years, and while I talk to him at the junkets and all that kind of stuff, over the years, never did the deep dive with him and spent nearly an hour with Ben just the other day talking about his directing career. His new film is Animals. It's on Netflix. Check it out. It's him and Kerry Washington, Steven Yeun, but also so much more. This guy has all the stories, and he's such a great, candid conversationalist. We talk Good Will Hunting. We talk Batman. We talk Gone Girl. We talk about being offered a Star Wars movie, about nearly directing the Batman movie. There's tons and tons in this. He really lived up to everything. I was hoping, and more. I know you guys are going to dig this. I'm so happy it finally happened. Ben Affleck on Happy, Sad, Confused. Before we get to the main event, though, quick reminder, as always, check out our Patreon for bonus content, for early access to our live events, all sorts of cool stuff. Patreon.com slash Happy, Sad, Confused. Supporting us over there helps us make more stuff over here. Okay, here we go, guys. No further ado. He speaks for himself, and he says a lot in this one. Enjoy my conversation. We're the one and only. And by the way, this was his last conversation of his press tour, so he let it all hang out. So thrilled it happened. Here's me and Ben Affleck. Enjoy. Ben, you're doing the podcast. I am. What a pleasure. You're locked in the room. You can't get out for the next 45 minutes. I am stuck here now. Yeah, I know. And you know what? It doesn't even alarm me. That's how good you're doing. That's how good my life is. This is flying in the face of Sad Affleck. This is no longer. He's Happy Affleck. Sad Affleck, you know. Sad Affleck shows up all the time. Unfortunately, it's my, I feel like any, my kids are obsessed with like taking my picture and trying to find the funniest sticker to make out of it. The worst, the worst looking possible picture. But it's, what it's taught me is that I, that I think my sort of general demeanor appears to be the resting, resting Ben face is what? Resting Ben face seems to be beleaguered or something. Or maybe I just, I don't know. It's that thing of, um, and you get a second and kind of, oh, maybe my resting face does, it should be no surprise. The resting face. We'll come back around to that. Let's talk animals and this great, I mean, this is literally the end of your press tour, by the way. Congratulations. You survived another one. Thank you very much. It's, you know what? They've gotten, uh, to be much more interesting experiences because of this phenomena, because of the, uh, preponderance, uh, importance and, and audience of a podcast principally and some other kinds of more, you know, creative sort of like social media shows and stuff. But like. So that what used to be, you know, four days of con you know, 50 consecutive five minute interviews repeat the exact same thing, which was a particular kind of hell is a very sort of, um, who wrote no exit? Was it something, you know, like very hellish sort of thing. Now you actually, you move around a little bit and you have longer conversations. Like I was saying, where you have some context and you have the ability to talk. It's such an interesting thing. Like I was talking to somebody the other day and they were saying like, what do you think it means that we've gone, you know, in one direction that there's like much shorter attention to the vine seven second thing to this, like, you know, a lot, much more long form thing. And it was sort of, obviously you have a different size audience. Like, so you're not, there is no more, Oh, 30 million, 40 million people watch Carson or something. Right. But you do have like your dedicated millions of people that are listening to, you know, various podcasts and actually finding the time for. You know, something that's more in depth. Well, and there are hopefully the hardcore folks, if they're investing 45 minutes or an hour in your conversation with me, that means they're, they're more likely to check out animals and be invested in. Yeah. If I can't make it sound interesting in 45 minutes, maybe it's not for you. So this has been a very happy, good press tour. What was the hardest press tour you've ever had to endure in your career? Whether because of where you were, because of the film, you had to kind of suck it up and promote. What do you say? I remember that. I remember that the press tour for, I did a movie called surviving Christmas. The press tour for that was really unpleasant, mostly because the studio had totally abandoned it and everybody knew it was a bomb. And it was kind of like, you just feel like you have to walk the plank. I'm like, Hey, if you guys are going to pull all the ads, do I still have to go through with every single person who sits down and says, interesting movie. So you're in a real hole. It's like, well, how is this helping anybody? Yeah. Yeah. I've had a few of those. It's nice. I also, that's different when you direct a movie, you know, it's like, if you can't find stuff to talk about, I mean, that really is the standard for me to, for choosing something to direct, you know, you may act in something you do eight, 10 weeks at the most these days, 12, maybe. And there can, there's a lot that you can find interesting and within a role for the period of time, but for directing it's, it's, it's a year plus commitment of work. And then, you know, there's the expectation naturally, like if the director's not going to promote them, you know, you're going to, you'll do anything to promote movie you direct. Or not anything, but you will do quite a bit of quite a few interviews and, and, you know, ostensibly it's because the movie has themes that you find really interesting and compelling and that are merit, you know, discussing to some extent. Well, and connecting that to, to animals, this is your latest directing effort and you're starring in it. I mean, I, what I find interesting about this is I feel like you're like luring them in with the kidnapping, like, oh, it's good. You know, it's a, it's a crime drama. It's, it's the town and like underneath it all, it's like a, like a Cassavetes, like a dissection of a movie. It's like a dissection of a marriage, essentially. But the town was the same thing. You know what I mean? All the movies that I've made, I viewed from even going back to Good Will Hunting, you know, that I've written or that I've kind of created, I, I've consciously thought, well, you've got to like make, give the entrance some, the audience rather, some entrance, some reason to see the movie. And part of that is like some genre expectation because you might, okay, you know, there's a shorthand around, I like a movie where, you know, there's kidnapping or horror movies or romantic comedy. Or whatever they are, because people do kind of have a sense of what the expectations are. And those conventions are, are quite useful in the sense that, you know, they're the guard rails that tell you whether, you know, whether you're hewing to the conventions or you're subverting the conventions, it's a common language with the audience. They can understand. And this notion that there's a bifurcation or a separation or a difference between movies of a genre and movies, which are art movies or serious movies or interesting movies, I think is a real false. False dichotomy, ostensibly, you know, I think it was T.S. Elliott who said something like the plot of a play is just the meat that you throw the guard dogs while the playwright, you know, is the cat burglar that breaks into the subconscious of the house, right? Like, and I really think that's true. There needs to be a, what's going to happen next urgency just because, you know, as Brando said, like an actor's only responsibility is not to bore the audience. You've got to engage and be mindful of the audience, but you don't have to. You don't have to pander. In fact, I think what you have to do is surprise the audience, right? Like somebody said, the ending has to be inevitable and surprising. And then while you've got the front brain worrying about, gosh, what's going to happen next and who's going to do what, they may not be saying gosh, they may be saying something else, but they, the front, the subconscious is like experiencing, you know, the stuff that is thematically interesting. In this case, as you mentioned, one of the themes is kind of what's, what constitutes a marriage, you know? Right. How vulnerable are we? And, and in particular, this question of like, or this, this, this, this sort of proposition that, you know, it's, it's somewhat counterintuitive since you want the person to fall in love with you to, to, to show a person that you love the aspects of yourself, which you don't particularly like or which they may not find appealing. However, what's really interesting to me is like, is that sort of the ideal? Like you could really be loved in a different way. If somebody. If you felt loved for, for all of that, all the ugliness and yeah, yeah, all the, and it's a really profound rejection to be rejected, you know, for your sort of your true truest self. And so one of the things I thought was really interesting about this movie was a married couple that does get to the point, if only because they kind of think the marriage is more or less over and they, I think they have nothing to lose where they both go, you know what? Fuck it. This is who I am. And you know what? You in the other, in the other one sort of does the same thing. And what I like about it, I don't exactly, you know, lay it out. But I think what's suggested there is that they actually have a very interesting, I mean, giving it away, but I think they actually find a kind of a marriage that really works for them. Right. Right. Can we take a step back and look at the directing career? Because it strikes me, it's been basically 20 years, 20 years ago, probably to almost to a date that you stepped on the set of Gone Baby Gone and launched this career as a filmmaker. Six films in. First, like where were you at? Like if I'm doing the math of like, like your career at that time. I guess like Hollywoodland had happened, was coming out that year, but you were kind of like bouncing back. You were kind of reinventing. Oh, I was, I think I was on the verge of extinction. Was directing the way back in for you to kind of reinvent at the time? Yeah, I mean, yes. And it was something that I wanted to do, but because of the nature of, you know, the sort of hand-to-mouth desperate nature of the psychology of being an actor, that I was just incapable of saying no to anything. So then I'm taking a job, I'm taking a movie. Well, I don't have time to be a director, right? And this is, and this is a, this is why I think Matt has not, Matt Damon has not directed simply because he's been so consistently presented with opportunities to work with great directors as an actor that he's never had this kind of space to do it. Like an 18 month to like, or two years to say, yeah. But I also, for me, it was, you know, it was, I mean, Surviving Christmas, like I mentioned before, like it was pretty much a wrap. I don't, I don't think I was going to be able to work. I was so uncool and so unsought after. And so kind of, in fact, at one point I went back and looked at some of the press, like around and about me from like 2003, 2004. It was like so virile and nasty. Well, they tore you down. They propped you up. They, they, they, they, as we well know. In a way now that even now would, would, would be viewed as irresponsible. Like one of the real examples of, I don't know if it was the same time, but it was roughly the same time, was like the way Britney Spears was treated. Yes. During what was obviously like an episode of tremendous trauma and mental health issues. And there, there was this sort of gleeful celebration and kind of hideous shot and cultural collective schadenfreude at, at, at, at, at what was going on with her. And I experienced something kind of similar, which was like, I mean, there were people who were saying like, you know, I can be literally like, well, one hopes Ben Affleck is dead soon, you know, stuff like that. Yeah. And you think like now people at least would, I reckon that it wouldn't be, you know, that would be called bullying or something, you know, along those lines. But it's true that at the end of the day, you know, if you do a bunch of work that isn't good, you know, you, you may not have expected people to cheer your death, but you know, you're not going to work. And so part of the condition really, whether it was explicitly stated or not for me to direct a movie was that, Hey, or one of the selling points was I'm not in it. You know, I, I actually was a plus truly. Like I remember thinking I, I don't even want my credit to sort of be eye catching at the, the, because I don't want people to have a negative connotation. I mean, it's, it's, it's one thing to be unknown. It's another thing to be like, no, we know who you are. We just don't like it. Right. It's like as a society's decided. And, and even the reviews for that movie were like, I remember one that was like, well now I know what my hat tastes like. It was kind of, and it wasn't even a rave. It was just like, fine, this isn't the worst piece of shit you've ever seen. Cause it's like, it's, it's a little bit like the high school bullying thing. Like people who hadn't even seen movies that were supposed to be like, you see it happening now, frankly, with Digger, everybody wants to celebrate this bomb as if like, it's the most exciting thing that happened. And you think like, it's a pretty ambitious, interesting movie made by interesting people that have talents and you know, everybody wants to count the money, what it may lost or whatever. And to me, I just think like if you punish movies, that take risks, guess what you're going to get a bunch of shitty homogenized movies, vanilla doubles as opposed because if you cannot do something interesting without taking a big swing and that means you're going to sometimes look bad. So yeah, for me it was, I'm not going to be in it and, and I got lucky because Miramax had been pried away from the Weinstein brothers at the time. Uh, I guess they went on to do the Weinstein company, but Disney had gotten rid of them and they didn't have anybody, not even Disney. And fortunately I had pretty good relationships like because I always been a pretty good team player and agreeable and that sort of thing. And this guy named Dick Cook who was running Disney at the time and we had a good relationship from, from Pearl Harbor is another movie that people sort of cheered. It was supposed to be a bomb as I was a very successful movie. Um, but you know, and Dick was willing to, you know, give me a chance with a, because they just didn't have any Miramax movies or at the time they didn't even have any executives. And they gave me, you know, a low budget to, to make a movie and, and let me do it. And, uh, you know, I, I, I kind of, it was just successful enough. Ironically that came out at a period of time, I think the, the year of the most theatrical releases in history. Like, as I remember, we were in sixth place that weekend and we were ahead of a movie with Meryl Streep and we Reese Witherspoon, you know, it was like that competitive every weekend. And, uh, you know, I, I kind of got to live to fight another day, but, but I was keenly aware of the fact that if that movie didn't work, I, you know, it was really likely that, you know, I may have to find another line of work. Uh, and that was really scary. More happy, sad, confused coming up. Starting or growing your own business can be intimidating and lonely at times. Your to-do list may feel endless with new tasks and lists can easily begin to overrun your life. So finding the right tool that not only helps you out, but simplifies everything as a built-in business partner can be a game changer for millions of businesses. That tool is Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world. And 10% of all e-commerce in the U S from household names like Jim shark, rare beauty and Heinz to brands. Just getting started. Shopify has hundreds of ready to use templates that can help you build a beautiful online store that matches your brand style. 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She watched the podcast, where we, recap, dissect and slightly overanalyze some of the best and craziest true crime documentaries on our favorite streamers. Did the spouse do it? Why is the shady neighbor wearing leather gloves in July? Why did this guy agree to be interviewed in this documentary? We ask the tough questions that you're often just screaming at your TV. So every week we break down the twists, red herrings and absurd documentaries that have kept you up all night. It's high, drama, cozy vibes and absolute couch detective energy. Grab your throw blanket and hit subscribe search murder. She watched wherever you listen to podcasts and let's solve this thing together. And even though that one, you know, it didn't make whatever a gajillion dollars, it got the critical reception. It earned you the right to make the town, which ended up being a critical and commercial success and not really set you off on the path of like where we are today. Yeah. But if if if if both either of those movies hadn't worked, I don't think we'd be having this conversation. Yeah. Surviving Christmas DVD, Spectacular Reunion, Surviving Christmas, a paycheck, Surviving Christmas, Geely, which is another that was one that everybody that was similar to probably more a perfect storm of it was like, yeah. And also, by the way, like a movie that didn't work, but not like the worst, not the worst. In fact, all the people that mocked and derided it, I think very few actually saw it. Right. It was a function of like, we're, we're so over, we're so exhausted by an overexposed by this Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez phenomenon, which itself was a function of being a tabloid story at a time when the tabloids really recognized there were, they had a much wider audience than they realized. And so there was this huge proliferation of these magazines. And so it seemed as if, you know, we were shoving ourselves down everyone's throats and we were wildly overexposed. So it was a lot of negative factors at work. Um, but just upset still that Martin breast basically was run out of, of filmmaking. Like he has not made a film since he was a young man. He's still around. Like he could, and that was, that was a real, a real, a real shame and a crime. Marty is a really good director. In fact, I probably learned how to direct from him and you know, you look at Beverly Hills cop or midnight run runs a perfect, you know, I mean he's, he's made. So it sent them a woman. He, he was, he is such a good director. Uh, and I'm not sure why I think he would have had the opportunity to do some stuff, uh, had he been willing to like after that do something kind of like crummy and ordinary, but I got the sense that he just wasn't interested in doing that. Um, but yeah, it was a, and I, I feel in some ways, you know, partly responsible for that. I feel bad. I mean, look at what that itself was a risky movie, not a particularly expensive movie, but a risky one. And one that ended up really falling flat kind of loudly. And, and, um, that was just like the, yeah, it was a shame. We lost on the, I think the really interesting movies that Marty, might have made subsequent to that. Can I ask you, I'm always fascinated by sort of like the, the, what ifs, the, the, the projects that came and went um and there's some directing opportunities that seemingly you had that just didn't work out did you go up for man of steel what became man of steel did you meet with chris nolan and the team about potentially directing superman no i did not meet with them about that i did but i was considering at a time directing a standalone batman movie right after that and did not feel like ultimately i wanted to do that but no i didn't i didn't uh and there haven't been too many movies that i turned down whether as an actor or director that i thought like oh that's a shame there have been some that have been successful so i'm very successful but i particularly as a director i just think like it's just somebody else is better for this you know correct me if i'm wrong though didn't you come close to star wars wasn't force awakens like an opportunity that yeah they came to me and yeah and asked me and and hey are you interested in this and i don't know that that meant they weren't also like talking to jj or other people they weren't like talking to jj or other people they weren't like talking to jj or other people but uh i talked to those folks at the time and that was one where i just was like again i thought like hey i like star wars and i'm a fan but i'm not the person to direct this movie i just think someone else who has more passion for this and is going to do a better job and that's not like some great self-sacrificing thing because i thought like i don't know that i can make a great version of star wars or reinvent this a lot of challenges to reinventing that in fact that you've seen played out it hasn't been easy for them to reinvent that franchise some have done really well some and you've got this whole fan base that's got its own very strong opinions and uh i yeah it just was one that like like plenty of scripts that i've gotten as a director i've certainly got better scripts as a director than as an actor that i've turned down but i just thought like you know what this this would be i i don't think i can do it as well as somebody else and i don't want to direct something that i don't feel like i have a chance to be really really proud of i i have had conversations over the years with a couple of people that you all have worked with on the batman film joe manganella who was going to be deathstroke bob richardson who was going to be your dp i mean that's an exciting prospect everything he does is remarkable and i've heard like joe tell me and others like he compared it to the game in some respects and bob told me a lot of it was in arkham is there anything about that that you did love that like you that's lots uh and i like playing that character particularly this sort of older broken very much derived from wholly derived from frank miller's you know book that that's what we were trying to do with that batman or superman but you know the truth is that the experience of justice league for me was so so negative for lots of different reasons some of which having to do just with where i was personally some of which having to do with some of the tragedy that happened during that time and also the fact that i really saw how not to make a movie like that which is when the studio is at odds with the you know you're starting at the worst possible you're you're really making a mistake and and you know that was what really doomed that i was really glad and gratified that zach got to really and he did in a very kind of canny way manipulated his way into getting his manifest released which was fucking great and i was really happy for him um boy that was shitty that him him him being taken off that movie and and the reshoots that we did that's that that was the low if you want the low point of my career was that so that that was i mean you know you bring it up like that was seeming like a perfect storm of horrible things happening what was going on with zach needless to say was a horrible personal tragedy you were going through it personally and professionally and and and this film is like kind of collapsing in front of you like did you kind of have any kind of moment of epiphany on that on that set about personal or professional yeah i mean look the personal thing you know somebody's uh death by suicide is that that eclipses yeah everything and and the and then the way in which that was i thought frankly used as an excuse i just thought it was one of the shittiest things i'd ever seen you know and it it was so gross and then and then the whole environment and vibe much of which i did wasn't privy to but that i sort of heard about second hand in terms of ray and gal and other people's experiences it was just like wow this is about as gross as it gets and i think it really and i was drinking too much you know that's when i started to feel like boy i'd like to quit drinking and i'm having a hard time not drinking i'm coming up with i'm just gonna do this i'm just gonna do that um and i got divorced i mean you know it was definitely like a very difficult time for me personally but i can imagine you know having gone through and dealt with that those things while painful they're not what impacted that movie i mean they they just happen to be happening at the same time yeah yeah yeah the um if you'll indulge me going back even outside of the directing career on the acting side because you know i've talked to matt a bunch on the podcast over the years and he's talked about going up for primal fear and all the roles that he wanted way back when i don't really know about like your story with like the auditions that you were going up for were you going up for the same stuff as matt in that time or those are the group of guys you know this is a time when um i don't know you kind of knew all the other guys yeah were going up for stuff and and you know because you'd see who would get the part and you'd see them in the rooms you know i was holding our sides and you kind of knew who they were and sometimes you'd work with them and um like who was the who was the guy who was the guy that was taking all your parts well the guy i looked up to you know was river phoenix he was the guy i thought like boy he's the best young actor around i still think that about him it's such a tragedy what happened that guy um and you know leo showed up around that time and he's a he is a mighty talent and has obviously proven that out over the years and and then there you know then of course yeah you had edward and matt and there was there were guys that i you know the brennan fraser and chris o'donnell and and then you know all the actors that i so many actors that i knew and hung out with who were friends like matthew or vince or you know favreau and uh you know and you had like gosh i mean you look through the cast of like school days exactly you know um were you competitive with those guys or were you competitive with those guys or were you competitive with those guys or was it sort of like everyone's going to get their time it's going to come you know to be honest like a lot of young actors i think i think a lot of actors feel competitive i'm really lucky i think my friendship with matt and the fact that i don't know this maybe the fact that my mom always sort of instilled in my brother and i a sense of like you know your own fate has to do with you there's not it's not a zero-sum game you know kind of a thing i felt like at the end of the day like you know the someone else's success isn't taken away from me and then that's a i'm lucky it's not some great virtue of mine it's that i was lucky beginning it made me feel a little bit more sane i didn't spend my time looking at movies and going why the fuck is this guy getting this and which which can happen to people and i i felt just um i kind of had a sense like i was getting cast i was bigger uh physically and heavier and and kind of every time i went in for the lead i'd always get called back for the the guy who was going to be the guy who was going to be the guy who was going to be the guy the bully or the bad guy or the guy who slams kids into their locker and so i was doing a lot of those parts yeah and that was my frustration and so i uh kevin smith really was the person who really cast me in a in a lead role that wasn't you know literally throwing someone into their locker and chasing amy and so you know that was really meaningful but also you know i was a i was pretty aware that like you know you probably had to to make it happen for yourself you know and and going out and kind of like this was the time where you know filmmakers like rick linklater who had done um slacker or kevin who had done clerks or or spike who years earlier had done do the right thing or quentin who did reservoir dogs like that was uh maybe not the first time i guess because you had cassavetes and people like that but it was a resurgence or an emergence of a diy spirit that you know sundance was really probably in its in its i think that it's high point because that was when all these really cool sex lives and videotape you know people were making these movies and you know the million dollars was kind of the number people threw around i have no idea what they what the movies really cost but the sense was if you could just cobble together not that that wasn't a lot of money it certainly felt out of reach for us otherwise we probably would we would have tried to finance i mean in fact when matt was went down and did a tnt movie with tommy lee jones uh called boys we were i was like okay give him our script you know we're gonna get him attached like quentin got harvey kytel attached right right and we're gonna do you know get him on board and i remember the first night matt was there in plano texas or wherever it was i called him up i said how'd it go and he was like i don't think tommy's gonna do our movie notorious pushover tommy lee jones i worked with him later and i was like yeah i get not an easy guy to approach yeah uh what is it what do you want son no i will not read your screenplay what else okay i still love that famous um batman forever story what's the the jim carrey story where he runs into him i will not sanction your buffoonery do you remember that story i don't even know but it doesn't surprise me i did a scene with tommy lee where and he was great in the scene it's a movie called company men that was uh you know it was about the economic crisis and people getting laid off and suicides it wasn't a great commercial success but i really liked the movie john wells was directed and he was great yeah chris cooper was in it sundance i think i talked to you at - Yeah, and I remember Tommy had this speech where he was walking down this pier and he was talking about what it used to be and the jobs that had been lost. And it was one of those great speeches. And I have a line. I just was walking along with him, staring at him. And I watched him. We got halfway through a take. I was like, wow, this is good. We got three quarters of the way through it. I was like, oh, fuck, Tommy is killing it. We got to the end. It was a great take and he knew it. And it didn't cut or anything. He just turned to the director and said, I think you're going to like your movie. And that's amazing. Only Tommy Lee can do that. I was like, I got to use that line. Still haven't used that line this time. You should say that. You're welcome, Mr. Fincher. He's like, you're welcome, David. Okay, ball game. Close it out. From the parents behind Law & Order comes a mystery the whole family can enjoy. Patrick Picklebottom Everyday Mysteries. Step into the whimsical world of Patrick Picklebottom, a precocious 11-year-old with a love for reading and an uncanny ability to solve mysteries. Inspired by the beloved children's book of the same name, this podcast vividly brings Patrick's tales of deduction and everyday adventures to life as he unravels baffling enigmas and solves clever cases. Patrick Picklebottom Everyday Mysteries is perfect for kids and is just as entertaining for grown-ups who love a good mystery. The whole family can listen now wherever you get your podcasts. Reality TV is messy. Pop culture is louder than ever. And the internet? Completely unhinged. Welcome to Roxanne and Chantel, the podcast where cousins Roxanne and Chantel break down reality TV, celebrity drama, and the stories everyone's texting about. We recap the shows, spill the headlines, and sit down with the stars themselves. No filter, no boring takes, just the tea. New episodes every week. If it's trending, we're talking about it. This is Roxanne and Chantel. Let's get into it. One of my favorite Good Will Hunting stories is, again, something Matt told me. I love your perspective. When you meet Michael Mann and you guys talk to Michael Mann and he basically says, your script's great, but I think you need to go a different way with the movie and basically wanted to kind of do the Michael Mann version of Good Will Hunting. Yeah, which like at the time surprises, but now looking at it, I just think, no, like filmmakers, you know, he was so thoroughly rooted in and had such an understanding of it, spent so much time researching. I mean, and you look at movies like Heat and you see why, like the LA crime world, you know, and so we came in and did it. He was like, I like the movie. I do like the picture, but I have something to show you guys. And we were like, okay. And he showed us a video of like a gang fight in an LA club. And he was like, this is what's going on. This is how what he's right now. You see what these guys are doing? And I was like, yeah, I see what they're doing. Seems like a bunch of Latino guys with face tattoos, like in a riot at some club downtown. It doesn't really have a bearing on, but it was just like what he's drawn to, you know what I mean? And look, Michael's like, you know, he, I mean, he's, he's, he's making a heat too now, you know, and it's that script I read. It's really fucking good. Did you talk to him about doing heat too? I'd have not. I cannot, unfortunately lay claim to, what do you, what do you mean the script? What's going on? You know, you get to a place where you just like, no guys. And, and I don't want to talk out of school, but I, I, because I'm a fan and I, and I know him and I want to read it. And it's also a book. I just thought like in, in, you know, I was curious about it and it's really good. I mean, and I think, you know, I mean, he's, I don't know how old Michael is. He may be 75 years old, you know, like he's, but I think it's, I think it's going to be a terrific movie. Ferrari was pretty good. Actually. So yeah. Yeah. Michael is one of the greats. Yeah. Have you had to resist this? That might sound silly, but knowing Hollywood, like have you had to resist the Goodwill hunting sequel? Have they come to you with like bags of money and like, come on guys, not bags of money. They did at one point when Miramax was bought again by somebody and like they did say they did come to us and you want to do a TV show or sequel. And I was like, it's just an easy, no, like, yeah, no, I don't, I don't know what it would be. And it just seems like a really, and look, I get it. Sometimes you get to a place where it's like, like I said, I've had the downturn in the career where you go like, shit, I don't know what else to do. And sometimes you get to that place and you go back to the well and go, you know what? Like, let me do this and kind of fire it back up. I don't have any, any judgment whatsoever. I've just lucky enough that I've never had to do it. And honestly, I don't know what, what the story would be. It just, one of the nice things about it is that it's kind of contained, you know, a couple of random ones. So Armageddon, did you, what did you make of the animal crackers scene? Did you feel like this is, this is romance that to have animal crackers and, you know, you got to remember this was at a time when like true romance had come out and, you know, or, or a crimson tide or whatever. And there was like the silver surfer monologue that went road. And so there was a, a, a kind of notion that like, you know, you wanted the right kind of surprising, iconic and also I was like, I had just done Good Will Hunting and screen tested for that movie. And I certainly wasn't in any position to like, my idea was like, just make it work if you can make it good. You know, I thought like doing my bad Aussie bit, you know, where it was, I watched the gazelle was like, you know, like that's how I could kind of make, make it funny. And it's a little silly. I mean the whole movie is a little silly, but it's got a lot of charm and it was a lot of fun. And you know, I got to work with like, I mean, that was a great, it was like Steve Semi and Billy Bob Thornton. I remember Billy Bob, we were doing that, you know, after Good Will Hunting. And then, and then we went, Billy had won the Oscar for writing the year before it was Sling Blade, which was a movie that we just like, you know, worshiped. And, and I saw Billy after the Oscars and I was like, and I said, party. And he was like, so let me ask you a question that did they give you guys like half an Oscar? It was like, you both wrote it. Did you get half a one or what? Well, what the fuck they give you guys to get a fractional, Oscar? You know, mine's a whole one, right? I do got a whole lot. He's a funny fucking guy. He was in that movie. Like Michael, I'm just wondering what the fuck we're doing here. Uh, then, I mean, I generally like to be in the kind of movies that make sense. Uh, but fuck it. Okay. We don't have to do that. We don't do that on this one. Fuck it. We don't have to make any sense. I just, I thought maybe it'd make some sense, but I guess not. You're recreating your, your famous DVD commentary live for me. Thank you. It's amazing. Did I do Billy in the DVD? I don't know, but in terms of, uh, calling it out, um, what was your favorite direction? David Fincher ever gave you what sticks out? Well, I'll tell you the first thing I remember is first or second day we were doing this kind of walk and talk scene and I'd done, I'd heard, Oh, David does a lot of takes. And so my thing was like, at that point I had learned enough to know, like you work with a good director, a great director that that's the goal. And I'm fine with that. If you're great, I'll do the fuck you want to do. I'm with you. I'll go all the way for you. And so my thing was like, I'm never ever going to be the guy who wants, doesn't want to do another take. I'll go as long as this dude can go in longer. That was kind of my ethos. Like, you know, I start directing anything else. I thought, I don't know that I'm any gift more gifted as any than anyone else at this, but I know I can work as hard as anybody. And so I sort of took that approach to that movie. And I remember we did, we had on take 21, David goes first print, delete all the previous takes. And I was like, and the motherfucker deleted all the takes prior to 21. And I thought he's not fucking around. He really is gonna, this is really how he works, but he doesn't need to say that. That's just like, that's, that's sending a message. It is sending a message. He, he was making a point and, uh, but you know what? I love David. Oh, I loved working for him. I really like people. I have found, like whether it was in high school or anywhere else, like the higher standard, you know, somebody held me to the higher I did. And, and I loved it. And I love thinking like, oh, it got addictive. Like, oh, we can just keep chasing excellence as hard as we can. And so it got to be something like that, where I just thought, great, maybe we'll just bleed all over the place and, and go as far as we can do. And, and, uh, and we'll get something greater. I don't actually now believe that. That's why David is a good director. I actually have another theory about why he does so many takes, but he'd get bent out of shape if I shared it. But, um, what's the truth on the Yankee hat story. He says on the commentary, maybe he's embellishing that production shut down for four days. He's such a lying motherfucker. That is such a fucking lie. I don't know why he, he loves to say shit like that. You just said you love David Fincher. Now what just happened? And I'm friends with him and I adore him and he'll fucking lie. If he thinks it'll get a reaction, he doesn't, he's gotta, he's got a very sort of dark sense of humor. And I know he thought like, I'll make Ben suffer for this for many years. Um, the truth is I don't think anyone had ever said like, no to him about anything. And he, he with this airport scene and he was like, yeah, I think you're wearing a Yankee set. And I said, ah, I don't think that's a good idea. David, he was like, looked at me like, you know, why are you talking to me? Uh, and I said, I just think like, look, I'm a red Sox fan. It's just going to be a big distraction. I'm wearing a Yankee set. Let's just do something else. And then he decided, no, no, no, it has to be an accent. And I was like, it doesn't, but why? I mean, you know in that it was probably all of 20 minutes that we talked about it and eventually it was like what about the mets and i was like all right sure man it's fine you win that was it and then he's like yeah it cost us 40 million dollars while ben affleck wouldn't wear the fucking i didn't take that long arguing over whether to be naked in the movie you know what i mean like uh i was like so i'm what i'm sorry what so hold on what can we see here he's like you're naked but like in what sense metaphorically and then i was just like oh fuck it all right you know um is there something about the one more batman question is there something about the batman suit that like the the the low pitch the growl comes i mean you have a deep voice anyway but like every batman has to do the i'm batman like that you can't help it is that just go with the territory because if you're like i'm batman it just seems farcical right um like that's not i want to watch you bleed yeah i'm gonna watch you bleed and i'm batman get away from me it's just not gonna i remember i did when i did armageddon speaking armageddon bruce willis once turned to me he's like man you got your your voice is too high i was like what he was like don't have that high voice i was like a bruce that's just my voice i can't i don't think can i change that um can surgery do what you're like man don't you don't want to sound like that man i'm helping you out bruce by the way i love bruce he's the sweetest guy in the world and he really was giving me a tip he was also like man don't go don't go do that shakespeare movie man you don't that's like can't be right all the time yeah no he was wrong about that one but he hadn't read the script in all fairness um it was that was one where i just didn't want to you know like often they're computer modified uh and i thought like well what if it's just that he also i like the idea the guy was you'd see the frank miller book i mean the guy's really old he's like i mean he's drawn intimidatingly enough to look like marlon brando um but he's you know quite gray-haired and just beat to shit and so i i kind of like the idea of him just being sounding literally you know kind of exhausted and and and gravelly in that sense and uh and and i like the fact that it wasn't because otherwise it begs the question you got like the voice modifier in the suit or something like that and i mean maybe i took it too literally you know it's not a criticism i'm just always curious about like what happens in there it just that that was just one of those things where and honestly you'd just feel a little bit more comfortable you got to get into it and then kind of if you don't believe that you're batman you're you're really in trouble and uh it's funny i heard stories about like tim burton and nicholson there's famous stories about him saying let the suit do the acting you know you gotta it's a it's a lesson actually that i learned from directing just in general which is as an actor we're apt to think that we need to do more work than we do and you've got to know that the movie and the battle ship and it's being powered and it's you know manned and everything by the whatever the nuclear engines and the guns and all that stuff and you don't have to paddle the ship yourself in fact if you do it looks like you're working too hard and the worst thing that you can do is work too hard because all of a sudden the audience is like stop fucking selling me something you know um has kevin feige tried to get you back as daredevil for something and are you open to it he hasn't i wish you would kevin feige is uh i mean i don't want that to say that as if and i don't i don't i really don't mean this in any way other than like i just feel that i've kind of done my superhero movies and i i don't know that i've there's anything left for me that's particularly interesting in them for me to do but i will say that of all the producers in the world who have like sort of pretended to kind of know what the audience wants the only guy i would ever believe is kevin feige kevin feige if you think about what he was able to and the set of daredevil he just wasn't in charge i it was one of the things i wish i'd go back in time on is like go back in time and be like no not you you you you come here come here what do you think we should do do you remember him on set did you talk to him i remember him yeah he was like a junior guy and avia rod was running it and you know the director and all this and everybody had their ideas and i was like i do you really should i really be sniffing and saying justice i just wonder if that's the best why and why am i sniffing what am i smelling and what does that have to do with justice is justice a smell um and i feel that kevin may have been on my side i like to think and also kevin just has a a really strong understanding for you know like exactly how to balance the sort of the degree to which you can be cheeky about the fact that you're wearing pajamas and then also when you can lean into a serious moment and when you when you need to like wink at the audience and how much of the sort of okay how do you balance these like a fight scene with the with a moment of comedy like he just has a talent for and as such it would appear to me from the outside and i have to caveat this by saying is that i'm just as much as an outsider as anyone sitting at home but my my view of of what he's done is to kind of construct marvel studios sort of in the way the a great showrunner runs a television series which is to have like hey we have the tone we have the cast we have the crew we we you know we built this script and here's your stunt coordinator like not that they just come on and say action yeah yeah but that like and there's certainly been filmmakers like like like ryan coogler who've really like left a unique stamp and mark on it and there's also been filmmakers who come into the marvel universe and been really successful and left and gone elsewhere and that isn't the case and i do think that it's because there's a kind of kevin feige backstop yeah uh and you've got a guy like like all the great showrunners it's just on a bigger scale who in they've done a good job at keeping secret whatever the i don't know what gets recut or what gets hashed out or whatever but but i would trust him no i mean you hear the stories about how they make these avengers movies and you're like really and somehow they all work out like they start without a script and then they build the guy you can't possibly understand how difficult it is to have 20 some consecutive billion dollar movies i mean i don't have i ever had one i mean christmas i think made a billion surviving prisoners made the one one thousandth of a billion dollars but i mean and i've had hit movies you know like look you talk about gong girl hey big hit or or pearl harbor or you know half a billion dollars right like and maybe that's a billion dollars in contemporary you know inflation adjusted but like nonetheless and you know batman versus superman that was a big success i think it was an 800 million dollar movie in order to do that it's just not an accident you know and then like yeah okay i'm sure they've been some misses along the way because it truly it's an it's an affront to the gods to be perfect he may he may be doing that on purpose right let me throw him one exactly it's like those old persian rug makers who intentionally weave a flaw into the rug i'm human yeah exactly uh but but he he has that understanding for that that genre story whatever so so do i think could we have benefited from him on darryl well i mean bet your life we could if you had a time machine that's what you do talk to the guy in the corner hell yes um okay two challenges before for you before you go i do this with actors that have amazing filmographies you're gonna pick your best movie bracket style so i'm pitting them against each other you ready sure goodwill hunting versus chasing amy what do you choose i can go hunting just because it's more personal to me okay gone girl versus armageddon the gone girl is more my kind of movie argo versus the town you know just different movies i really do love love both of the movies um i mean i would say argo just because i had grown as a director and tried more things and and and i honestly i think the level of difficulty was higher i really did not know whether or not i'd be able to have these two really different tones work in the same movie where you've got like mock execution of real movies in iran and like straight up kind of hollywood satire comedy i i thought like we could end up being you know laughed off the road yeah um so so i would say i guess argo bvs versus the way back i like them both for different reasons the way back again is is i'm always going to opt for a a more personal story you know obviously a movie where about like the the loss of a child and and that kind of grief and in that case like you know triggering you know alcoholism and all sorts of things but at the end of the day that that movie was also like a real growth movie for me as an actor i feel that i i feel sort of like a late bloomer in a lot of ways and i'm glad that i had the chance to stick around long enough to to become an actor that where i feel i'm capable of doing kind of interesting stuff kind of on purpose uh and that was one where i i i really i felt that i was able to like conjure some kind of authentic stuff that uh you know when i was younger i probably wouldn't have been able to do yeah i'm being brave to like mind your own shit in the best possible possible way and you're always kind of theoretically minding your own shit but again it's sort of you can't get blood from stone you know if you don't have something that gives you opportunity to do something that's human and real it's a lot of credit credit to to gavin o'connor is a wonderful director and uh whom i adore uh and was really my partner on that and you know the studio didn't really want to do that movie and we had to bring the price down and we had to bring the price down and we had to bring the price way down and uh but at the end of the day it was like god i love that movie i love work with the young guys who are playing basketball players it reminded me of being that age and doing school ties and just starting out and janine come on car was in the movie i loved and it was just one of those ones that i was a real favorite of mine okay so you're down to the final four uh goodwill hunting versus gone girl oh i mean you know good one thing will always be like a formative movie for me although you know gone girl is really also truly honestly i love gone girl but like getting to become friends with david fincher and getting to know him is one of the guys i really love in my life is has been his incredibly meaningful gift this is two of my like you know favorite people in the world david and matt so today for today for this moment you just have to choose one it's okay it's not binding for life mall rats and then argo versus the way back then argo okay argo versus mall rats i guess oh that's close but i'm gonna go with argo okay there it is we end every happy second fuse with profoundly random questions ben are you a dog or a cat person dog what do you collect cameras what's your favorite movie posters yes what's your favorite movie poster you got i've got a um i've got a uh grand illusion first edition poster and uh that's one of my favorite movies my favorite filmmaker and that's probably my most cherished of all posters what's your favorite video game of all time oh man that's a good question fuck that's hard what have you sucked what sucked the most life out of you the time out of you what's i mean there was a game called starcraft that probably took the most life out of me for a period of time like where i did and i like just got famous and all i did stay home for three years and play starcraft where's ben unavailable due to starcraft yeah although like i love you know valorant's a great game it's a great game the problem with that game is that i just with kids that have been raised like playing i just get fucking rocked and i i'm like are you motherfuckers cheating you know what i mean and i get mad and they're like 11 and like fuck you loser and it's uh it's very humiliating but that's a great game i love 2k i love madden i love um you know and and the early like doom when when i first played that game which then gave rise to quaking gave rise to all that that's a great game we played that you know endlessly for hours like we were doing good hunting we were playing that i think we were playing doom yeah before even we were playing doom i remember writing and taking these long breaks to play doom i can't believe it's been that long um i like and then there's other i like i like those like just kind of real-time strategy civilization building style which is sort of gone out of style starcraft was one of those um you know there's an old game called mist that was a fabulous game the great storytelling and now you're on that island and i feel like like somebody there's an opportunity for somebody to do something like that again that was an amazing video game it's like the prisoner vibes remember that show i love that i mean but like i played for again i mean you know like donkey kong and tetris and miss pac-man for tens of millions of hours and after school going to the arcades in the old days when i was a kid playing those classic games and and so much so that i even i still have a miss pac-man video stand-up video i still have a miss pac-man video game and i i mean i i'm a great uh fan of the uh and lover of video games and now i play i get to play 2k with my son and lose which is it's so humiliating you and your 14 year old son just fucking just beats you and then just mocks me and derides me and it's all i can do not to get really petty and competitive dakota johnson asked me this i ask everybody would you rather have a mouthful one beat my butt yeah in fact i'd love that anytime you want to we'll get that we'll get that sorted for you what's the wallpaper on your phone uh my kids picture me my kids does this ever happen last actor you were mistaken for do you ever get mixed up with anyone oh yeah i went to the premiere of uh flirting with disaster and somebody came up and was like you're amazing in this film i assume they thought i was ben stiller uh i get mistaken for matt all the time where people call me matt all the time i don't think i'm actually mistaken but i think they they sort of whatever dyslexia the names yeah um i have been mistaken for maybe jake gyllenhaal probably like matt dylan um which like it's really random like you just don't i've been mistaken you know there is that thing where people are just like i know you vaguely from something um just tell me your filmography that's not yeah aren't you the guy from i'm like nope if you don't know my name i deal no selfies i'll get a picture with you who are you again nope nope not doing it gotta know the name i was in motherfucking surviving christmas show some respect the thing about surviving christmas i have to say interestingly which is which is the great gift of this life that i've had which has been enormously fortunate you know you even punctuated by all the uh uh you know there's moments of disappointment like surviving christmas like jim gandolfini was one of the great men i've ever known a prince lovely guy a phenomenal actor and i wouldn't take that movie back for anything christina applegate getting to work with her she is she's a spectacular person like so some of these experiences well maybe not great for the audience were definitely great for me you know i mean i guess i learned so much from i've learned more from from mistakes and from perceived failures and success success hasn't taught me anything other than to be a little bit more conservative or try to maintain it or worry about losing its success failure teaches you that you can get back up off the ground that you can be resilient that like fail that like you can take risk because what's you've survived failure uh and it also teaches you like for me it was like if i'm gonna fail i'm gonna fail on my own merits i'm not gonna kind of hew to what i think other people think i should do because like you might failing on those terms is the worst possible thing yeah yeah what's the worst note a director has ever given you you can name the name or not uh uh i i mean you know something along the lines of like it's just it's like it's fucking stupid or so you know like i won't say who my man is but he was a very blunt guy you know honestly that's michael bay that's michael bay i'm not gonna say but there are you know the truth is like i remember asking sean penn once like what like i remember i don't even know him particularly well i'm just a fan and i i ran into him at the thing and we were talking and i asked him what he what frustrated him with the directors and stuff because i was thinking about it myself and he just said too much talk right and i remember thinking yeah like the truth is once you get there if you're working with good actors like it's not so much about the notes you know what i mean and sean's like i can play one fucking thing you know you want to spend talk for a half an hour man what faster like what do you want it's the compulsion to fill the space like i have to justify my exactly like you can you can do your whole soliloquy about it if it makes you but i'm here and i gotta go take all these and go out and play it like you're cluttering my brain with your shit now yeah you're dumping all your your shit on me like um so so i've been lucky in that i really learned that like the thing to do with actors is to give them a sense of authorship freedom and support and that that's really what's likely to get the best results okay and finally in the spirit of happy second fuse an actor who makes you happy you see them on the screen you're like oh man i'm not gonna do this you're gonna do this you see them on screen you're in a better mood oh boy uh actor that makes me happy there's let's see i want to say somebody uh uh you know um i have to say somebody just forgot their name a new actor who's really terrific but i i feel like my brain is filled up with names um an actor who i see that makes me happy i'll say morgan freeman every time i see morgan on screen it's just like it doesn't matter what he's doing doesn't matter if he's just like hello i'm like this is wonderful i love the guy and he i had a chance to work with him a couple of times this is a gift but he he makes me happy to see and they can watch i could watch the end of shawshank redemption any day and that would make me happy that whole like you know i hope i hope to see my friend andy again and shake his hand i hope the pacific is as blue as been in my dreams i hope i mean that's to me like uh sort of the whole thing in a nutshell what's a movie that makes you sad oh gosh lots of them i mean um i'll tell you a movie that made me sob with tears that i think is a is a is a uh masterpiece and the best depiction of alcoholism that's ever been rendered on screen is a movie called to leslie andrea rice bros in it and that performance is as authentic and moving as anything i've ever seen on screen and that woman i i just i i was so mesmerized by it that i asked to have a meeting with her and i met her and once i met her i was like oh my god i'm gonna die i'm gonna die i'm gonna die i was just like it was even harder for me to believe that she didn't and i was like you must be an alcoholic and she was like no no i'm afraid and i was like what you know how did you do that i mean that that's one of the best performance i've seen in i don't know decades she's a chameleon she's always different fuck is she something else boy and finally a food that makes you confused you don't get it why do people eat that gluten gluten-free things you like your gluten yeah i'm like if you're not it's kind of like alcohol-free beer you know what i mean i just go ahead and have some sudsy carbs like no not really uh what's the the whole point of this thing here is to get your gluten on although this i don't mean to prejudice judge anyone who is needs to eat you lost the gluten lobby all gluten lovers all the non all the gluten allergic people but yeah other than that i don't know why you would would choose to eat something that's gluten-free it's sort of like taking the heart out of the melon you know uh fuck it man that life is uh bread is the the bread of life and there's the wisdom there it is there's the wisdom of the day get yourself a big loaf of bread plant yourself in front of the tv enjoy animals on netflix congratulations sir your press tour is officially done and i don't think i was canceled we'll find out when everything you know you've been through worse i'd like to think that i really appreciate the time thanks very much i appreciate it too it's great and so ends another edition of happy sad confused remember to review rate and subscribe to this show on itunes or wherever you get your podcasts i'm a big podcast person i'm daisy ridley and i definitely wasn't pressured to do this by josh oh please not that music that music gives me nightmares from my childhood could we get something a little bit lighter some lighter music here are you a fan of true crime tv shows and what about unsolved mysteries the show that jump-started all of our love of true crime i'm ellen marsh and i'm joey taranto and we host i think not a true crime comedy podcast covering some of the wildest stories from your favorite true crime campy tv shows all the way to unsolved mysteries baby you will laugh you will cry you'll think about true crime in a whole new way and you'll also ask yourself who gave 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