As far as creative duos go, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck comprise one of the most effective in all of Hollywood. They make some of the best movies together, and the two friends clearly help each other out at any opportunity, too.
The pair joined forces once more for their new movie, Air. The movie based on a true story is pretty damn good, too, as you can tell from our Air review. They’ve been collaborating for years, and it turns out Affleck helped his buddy through a tough time when Damon was first finding his feet in the movie industry.
In an interview with People, Damon explained how he found the spotlight a little daunting at first, and revealed what Affleck did to support him at the time.
After the two shot to fame with their Oscar-winning ’90s movie Good Will Hunting, Damon struggled with the attention. He said: “It’s been really helpful to check in with Ben throughout this whole surreal process over the last 25 years. I think the shock of becoming famous is so… I mean, that messed me up for a couple years.”
You might be thinking being famous can’t be that bad, but Damon added: “The whole world just starts to treat you differently. And so your subjective experience changes. It’s like somebody rewrites your code in the Matrix, but just your code. It’s like, ‘Oh, my whole experience has been altered in this really overwhelming way.'”
It’s the simple things that mean the most, clearly, as Damon described what Affleck did for him. “To have somebody who I’ve known my whole life who I can be like, ‘Hey man, is this happening to you? Are you…?’ And to check in with him, it was really, really helpful. Stabilizing.”
For more on the latest Ben Affleck and Matt Damon movie, you might be curious how to watch Air. Alternatively, look ahead to The Flash release date, where Affleck will end his time as a Batman actor.