Ben Affleck is making the press rounds again at the moment, promoting his new Netflix political thriller Animals by fielding a lot of softballs about topics like why he doesn’t want to run for political office. (As opposed to, say, questions about the massive AI deal he made with Netflix for more than half a billion dollars last year, which somehow keeps getting relegated to parenthetical side comments like this one.) Still, his latest interview today, with Variety—which is mostly focused on his and buddy Matt Damon’s studio Artists Equity, and its genuinely admirable efforts to share the wealth in Hollywood with the people actually making movies and shows—did hit on at least a few interesting points, including the fact that Affleck has decided in recent years that he has no choice but to embrace his own public persona and become “the beleaguered man” of our collective dreams.
Admittedly, Affleck himself didn’t coin that phrase for his recent public persona, which was apparently dreamed up, with a definite air of mockery attached, by his daughter. But he does acknowledge that being the guy chugging Dunkin’ while smoking a weary morning cigarette in front of a paparazzi’s camera is the Ben Affleck version of becoming a modern-day influencer. (Even as he’s quick to note that ex-partners Jennifer Lopez and Jennifer Garner are way better, and work way harder, at cultivating this kind of genuinely lucrative public persona.) “That’s the spirit and nature of media and celebrity interaction now,” Affleck noted. “You have to have a sense of humor and be in on the joke with people. Like how I became a meme for ‘the beleaguered man,’ as my daughter calls it.”
Among other things, Affleck notes that he’s talked to the current up-and-coming generation of actors, the ones who are currently fielding constant questions about their social media followings from casting directors, and notes that they have it way harder than just playing along when people online make jokes about what an over-it 54 he sometimes rocks. “Every time I do a movie with young actors, we talk and I get a sense it’s tougher,” Affleck says. (While also acknowledging that coming up under the fiery eye of the resurgent tabloid press wasn’t a picnic either.) “They feel an enormous pressure to be accruing an online following. Casting directors ask about [social followings] because it’s a meaningful metric.”
Now, is Affleck, personally, making those struggles any easier by replacing parts of the filmmaking process with his very expensive computers? Shhhh! Those aren’t the kinds of questions we ask the beleaguered man when he’s got a movie to promote.
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