Ben Affleck
ALL ABOUT BEN AFFLECK
Full Name:Benjamin Geza Affleck
Date of Birth:August 15, 1972
Place of Birth:Berkeley, California
Family : Mom (Chris), Dad (Tim), Younger Brother (Casey)
Education:University of Vermont Burlington, Vermont
Occidental College Eagle Rock, California
Fan Mail:
Ben Affleck
9100 Wilshire
6th Floor
West Tower
Beverly Hills, CA 90212
Ben Affleck
c/o Creative Artists Agency
9380 Wilshire Blvd.
Beverly Hills, CA 90212
Bio:
This tall, dark-haired, buffed actor first appeared in front of the cameras in the 1981 independent film “The Dark End of the Street” before making his TV debut at age 12, on the PBS production, “The Voyage of Mim” in 1984. The pre-teen Ben Affleck first won notice as Madeline Kahn’s son who is trying to find a suitable husband for his mother in “Wanted: The Perfect Guy,” a 1986 “ABC Afterschool Special.” He appeared in the 1987 miniseries “Hands of a Stranger” (NBC), was Patrick Duffy’s son in “Danielle Steel’s ‘Daddy’” (NBC, 1991), and, in his first series, was a strapping football-player in “Against the Grain” (NBC, 1993). Affleck also starred in the 1994 HBO “Lifestories: Families in Crisis” installment, “Body to Die For: The Aaron Henry Story” about a teen whose life is imperiled when he becomes addicted to steroids.
On the big screen, Affleck began his career generally playing the heavy in features ranging from “School Ties” (1992), in which he was one of the football-playing anti-Semitic gang, to Richard Linklater’s “Dazed and Confused” (1993), where he was a high school senior terrorizing freshman students on the last day of school. He went on to begin an association with filmmaker Kevin Smith appearing in the ensemble of “Mallrats” (1995) and enjoyed a breakthrough as a comic book artist who falls in love with a lesbian in Smith’s subsequent “Chasing Amy” (1997). That same year, he displayed a more sensitive side as a Korean War veteran with artistic aspirations in “Going All the Way.”
What really brought the actor to public consciousness, however, was a script he and childhood buddy actor Matt Damon had written about a troubled math genius which Miramax purchased in 1996. After the script was restructured and polished through rewrites, “Good Will Hunting” (1997) was filmed with Gus Van Sant at the helm, Damon in the lead and Affleck in the major supporting role of Damon’s best friend. The feature opened to generally positive reviews and strong box-office and the attendant hype thrust the novice screenwriters into the limelight and raised their stock in Hollywood. The pair snagged several awards for their script culminating in a Best Original Screenplay Oscar. (”Good Will Hunting” itself received 10 nominations, including Best Picture.)
With literally his pick of scripts, Affleck undertook an image change by co-starring as a hotshot oil driller who is part of a crew selected to save the world from the threat of an asteroid in “Armageddon” (1998), directed by Michael Bay. Switching gears, he donned period garb to play a wastrel actor in Elizabethan England in “Shakespeare in Love” (also 1998). Continuing his string of work, Affleck landed the role of a bartender amid the ensemble of hot players (e.g., Christina Ricci, Courtney Love, Paul Rudd, Jay Mohr) in “200 Cigarettes”, reunited with Damon as renegade angels in Kevin Smith’s “Dogma” and was paired with Sandra Bullock in the romantic comedy “Forces of Nature” (all 1999).
Kicking off the new millennium, the actor continued to impress even when in material of questionable quality (i.e., “Reindeer Games” 2000). Affleck anchored the -testosterone-fueled “Boiler Room” (2000) as a slick Wall Streeter coaching new recruits and offered perhaps his most complex screen characterization to date as the hard-drinking ad executive whose life undergoes a complete change after a brush with death in “Bounce” (also 2000). He reunited with director Bay for the big-budgeted, highly hyped “Pearl Harbor” (2001), playing one leg of a romantic triangle that involved his best friend (Josh Hartnett) and the nurse they both love (Kate Beckinsale). Deploying his charisma and forceful screen presence, Affleck was not overshadowed by the special effects. Continually working, the actor went on to appear in “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back” (2001) for director Kevin Smith. In Smith’s self-described coda to his “View Askew” universe, Affleck appeared as both Holden, the character he played in Smith’s “Chasing Amy” and as a parody version of himself, the Hollywood actor.
Affleck next delivered one of his most compelling performances in the psychological thriller “Changing Lanes” (2002), playing an arrogant, high-powered attorney whose random traffic encounter with a struggling father (Samuel L. Jackson) sets in motion events that will radically derail both their lives. The actor next took on the weight of a struggling film franchise when he stepped into the shoes of Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford by essaying the Tom Clancy hero Jack Ryan in “The Sum of All Fears” (2002), with the character retrograded back to a green CIA analyst who becomes embroiled in a nuclear calamity—although the film was one of the weaker adaptations of Clancy’s work, audiences accepted Affleck in the role and delivered a strong box office.
Even as the actor was offered an increasing succession of leading man parts in major motion pictures, he kept a hand in the behind-the-scenes field that earned him an Oscar. Affleck and Damon also teamed as executive producers and writers for the ABC 2002 midseason replacement series “The Runner” which was delayed and has yet to air; and the two friends executive produced (and Affleck co-created) the Fall 2002 ABC series “Push, Nevada”, a unique hybrid of a “Twin Peaks”-style mystery and a game show: viewers were invited to follow each episode’s clues and unravel the mystery to win $1 million. Even when the network pulled the series after only a few low-rated episodes, the cash prize was awarded to a faithful fan.
Perhaps most prominently, Damon and Affleck dreamt up an Internet-related venture: a screenwriting competition called “Project Greenlight.” With Miramax and HBO as co-sponsors, the contest (at www.projectgreenlight.com) resulted in an HBO TV series (aired in 2002) and the promised feature “Stolen Summer” (2002), written and directed by Peter Jones and starring Kevin Pollak and Aidan Quinn. The response was strong, and a second “Project Greenlight” season was aired in 2003.
In addition to his box office star power and behind-the-scenes clout, Affleck also became a magnet for media attention, partly as a result of his high-profile romances. His on-again, off-again relationship with “Bounce” co-star Gwyneth Paltrow had already put him in the spotlight, and the media’s curiosity seemed to escalate in 2001 after Affleck voluntarily checked himself into a posh Malibu rehab clinic and underwent a one-month program to curb his alcohol abuse. Shortly thereafter, Affleck met fellow superstar Jennifer Lopez while working on the hit man romance “Gigli” (2003) and was impressed enough with the actress to suggest her as his leading lady for his friend Kevin Smith’s latest romantic comedy “Jersey Girl” (lensed 2002). Upon Lopez’s separation from her second husband, the two began dating and fueled a feeding frenzy of media scrutiny about their relationship, coverage that peaked with the announcement of the two stars’ engagement in November of 2002. Affleck, as a likely result, was also named 2002’s “Sexiest Man Alive” by People magazine.
Meanwhile, Affleck agreed to tackle yet another major role, starring in “Daredevil” (2003), an adaptation of the Marvel Comics superhero. Based on the blind lawyer whose enhanced radar senses lead him to fight crime who was popular among comics fans but little known to the general public, “Daredevil” saw its stakes raised with the mega-success of “Spider-Man” (2002) the previous summer and the high-profile casting of the newly-minted but not-quite-proven superstar Affleck. Much debate ensued about Affleck as the square-jawed leading man, but paired with leading lady Jennifer Garner the actor proved quite effective as a superheroic underdog, as both the seemingly handicapped attorney and his karate-kicking alter-ego who struggles with a tortured past, ambiguous moral dilemmas and a tragic romance.
Causing even more media furor was the subsequent 2003 release of “Gigli,” a film which underwent much reshooting and reconfiguring to accommodate the public’s expectation of romance between Lopez and Affleck, although Lopez’s character was written and initially shot as a confirmed lesbian. The film, a gangster action-comedy in which Affleck plays an incompetent mob thug, was the victim of bad buzz for months before its release and received a critical drubbing—possibly even an over-harsh response—when it finally hit theaters, giving it almost “Ishtar”-like bomb status. The fallout even affected the stars’ relationship, resulting in a postponement of their planned September 2003 wedding.
Publicly penitent over the creative failures of “Daredevil” and “Gigli” and the overexposure of “Bennifer,” Affleck tried to rally at the end of 2003 with “Paycheck,” a John Woo-directed sci-fi thriller based on a Phillip K. Dick premise, with Affleck playing a brilliant computer engineer whose short term memory is erased to protect government secrets, with possibly nefarious overtones. Competently made and a modest hit at the box office, “Paycheck” nevertheless did little to diffuse Affleck’s tabloid headlines. Finally in early 2004 the Affleck-Lopez romance was officially kaput, and the actor made a valiant effort to spin his tabloid troubles into box office receipts for his next effort, writer-director Kevin Smith’s romantic comedy “Jersey Girl” (2004)–even as Smith and the film’s marketing team tried to downplay Lopez’s small role in the film as much as possible. In the middling film—which was ultimately not nearly the commercial, creative or critical disaster “Gigli” was—Affleck plays a hard-driving, city-dwelling publicist who finds himself a widowed father suddenly trapped in the suburbs who unexpectedly gets a second chance at love.
The actor’s losing streak continued with the dismal holiday comedy “Surviving Christmas” (2004), which cast him in his first “wacky comedy” role as a successful but unhappy businessman who pays a family living in his childhood home to provide him with a warm Christmas experience. In between films, Affleck embarked on another high-profile, if slightly less controversial, romance, this time with former co-star Jennifer Garner; the couple ultimately became pregnant and were married in June 2005. He may have revived himself, however, with a strong performance in the celebrity biopic-cum-crime noir, “Hollywoodland” (2006), playing original “Superman” actor George Reeves whose apparent suicide was surrounded by mysterious circumstances. His death is investigated by Louis Simo (Adrien Brody) whose own past and connections to the events surface the further he digs in. For the role, Affleck took the De Niro approach to his character, packing on a few pounds to give his character the necessary heft and world-weary appearance. Meanwhile, Affleck was part of an ensemble cast for “Smokin’ Aces” (2007), an action-comedy dealing with the disappearance of a semi-famous Las Vegas magician.
Trivia:
His one-year-old daughter Violet was baptized on Christmas Eve. (December 28, 2006)
Affleck and Matt Damon are looking to co-direct a movie together. (December 19, 2006)
Says he is relieved his relationship with J.Lo fell apart because he felt his life was becoming miserable. (November 16, 2006)
Was so sure he would miss out on the top acting prize at the 2006 Venice Film Festival, he planned to fly back home to Los Angeles early.
Is the current favorite to play the role of Magnum P.I in the anticipated big-screen adaptation of the hit 1980s TV series. (June 16, 2006)
Was treated a Cambridge hospital for a migraine attack. (May 31, 2006)
Is selling the Brentwood, California bachelor pad he bought from rocker Melissa Etheridge in 2004 so he can concentrate on being a family man. (January 2, 2006)
Denies claims he and wife Jennifer Garner are sponsored by coffee giants Starbucks to drink its beverages whenever they are in public. (December 6, 2005)
First child, a girl, was born on December 1, 2005.
Affleck and Jennifer Garner are reportedly planning to quit Hollywood, to raise their child on a sprawling estate in New York’s upscale Westchester County. (October 17, 2005)
Virginia Democrats have reportedly hatched plans to run Affleck against Republican Senator George Allen in 2006 election. (September 29, 2005)
Signed a $1.8 million deal to be the face of popular British deodorant Lynx. (August 27, 2005)
Is reportedly writing a new TV show, political thriller Resistance which is thought to be set in a divided America after a series of terrorist attacks. (August 25, 2005)
Is trying to kick his cigarette habit for the sake of his baby. (August 15, 2005)
Did not invite best pal Matt Damon to his wedding with Jennifer Garner because he fears the event’s security.
Filmography:
Ben Affleck’s Filmography as an Actor:
2007 Smokin’ Aces
2006 Clerks 2
2006 Hollywoodland
2005 Man About Town
2004 Saturday Night Live: Ben Affleck [2]
2004 Surviving Christmas
2004 How’s Your News? On the Campaign Trail
2004 Jersey Girl
2003 Project Greenlight: Season 02
2003 The Curse of the Bambino
2003 Gigli
2003 Daredevil
2003 Paycheck
2002 The Third Wheel
2002 The Sum of All Fears
2002 Changing Lanes
2001 Daddy & Them
2001 Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
2001 Pearl Harbor
2000 Saturday Night Live: Ben Affleck [1]
2000 Bounce
2000 Reindeer Games
2000 Joseph: King of Dreams
2000 Boiler Room
1999 200 Cigarettes
1999 Forces of Nature
1999 Dogma
1998 Phantoms
1998 Shakespeare in Love
1998 Armageddon
1997 Good Will Hunting
1997 Going All the Way
1997 Chasing Amy
1996 Glory Daze
1995 Mallrats
1993 Dazed and Confused
1992 School Ties
1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer
1991 Danielle Steel’s ‘Daddy’
1987 Hands of a Stranger
1986 Wanted: A Perfect Guy
Ben Affleck’s Filmography as a Director:
2007 Gone Baby Gone
Ben Affleck’s Filmography as an Executive Producer:
2006 Feast
2003 The Battle of Shaker Heights
2002 Stolen Summer
2002 The Third Wheel
2002 Speakeasy
2002 Push, Nevada [TV Series]
Ben Affleck’s Filmography as a Producer:
2001 Project Greenlight [TV Series]
Ben Affleck’s Filmography as a Screenwriter:
2007 Gone Baby Gone
2002 Push, Nevada [TV Series]
1997 Good Will Hunting
Ben Affleck Awards:
Academy
1997 Best Original Screenplay Good Will Hunting
Broadcast Film Critics Association
1997 Best Original Screenplay Good Will Hunting
Golden Globe
1997 Best Screenplay Good Will Hunting
National Board of Review
1997 Special Achievement Award Good Will Hunting
Leave a comment