the awards editions 2010-2011

WItH HIS LateSt dIReCtoRIaL eFFoRt Ben aFFLeCk HaS BeCome
an aCtoR and WRIteR WHo Can do It aLL
oN thE towN
By mIke FLemInG
ben Affleck’s career trajectory rarely
happens in Hollywood much less all
by age 38: from unknown actor (Mallrats,
Chasing Amy) to Oscar–winning
co–writer (Good Will Hunting) to
leading man (Armageddon, Pearl Harbor,
Changing Lanes, The Sum of All
Fears, Daredevil) to tabloid fixture
(“Bennifer”) to washed–up star (after
Gigli) to budding director (adapting Dennis Lehane’s novel
Gone Baby Gone) to hot actor/helmer with the #1 opening
movie September 17–19. For The Town, Affleck once again
leaves rarefied Tinseltown and returns to his Boston roots
and blue collar crime to adapt Chuck Hogan’s novel Prince
Of Thieves for the big screen. The result: an adult–pleasing
hit that has entered the Best Picture discussion.
DeaDline: So you wrote yourself a second career as a director in
Gone Baby Gone. Now you’ve written yourself the edgiest role of
your acting career since Good Will Hunting. How much of this
was about you wanting to reinvigorate your onscreen career?
ben affleck: A huge part of this was wanting to play the
role. I hadn’t had the chance to play a character as interesting
as the one Chuck wrote in the book in a long time. In that
sense, it did feel like Good Will Hunting because I was trying
to make the movie, in part, as a step in my acting career.
DeaDline: These R–rated crime dramas with action sometimes
get marginalized in Oscar season, but this one has stayed in the
conversation. Gone Baby Gone, though lauded, grossed only $35
million worldwide. The Town so far has done more than $122
million worldwide. What has most surprised you about the way it
played and the reaction?
affleck: Relative to my first movie, it didn’t have to do
that well to be a step forward, so I was set up well. I think
people caught up to that movie on DVD, but when you
come out and do $20 million at the box office, nobody
calls to congratulate you. In terms of pure commercial success,
the thing that struck me was, our opening weekend
on The Town was bigger than the whole number on Gone
Baby Gone. This time, I had very modest expectations and
I was really surprised the movie did as well as it did. It’s
not a juggernaut, but my big goal was seeing it turn a profit
for the studio. I use that as my metric for whether or not
they’ll let me direct another movie. I remember calling up
and saying, ‘So have you broken even yet? Are you going to
make money on this? Are you happy?’ I’m a little embarrassed
I’d done that, but it was what I set out to do. And it
made me be sure I kept the costs down to under $40 million.
This way I could make a movie that dealt with themes
that interested me, at a pace I like dramatically.
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