Damon and Affleck, Samberg and Timberlake and other star brothers-comrades: how actors manage to be friends for decades

Biography

Matt Damon is an American actor nominated for an Oscar for his roles in the films Good Will Hunting, Invictus and The Martian. But it was screenwriting that brought Damon the coveted statuette: in 1998, he received an award for the original screenplay for the first of these films.

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Oscar winners Ben Affleck and Matt Damon
Matt is no stranger to acting in 5 projects at the same time, but there is a drawback to this - there is no time to add an item to his filmography in which his name will be indicated in the “director” column. Now Damon spends every free minute learning the art of production and is glad that the teachers, for the most part, are geniuses.

“I can afford to choose the roles that interest me, guided by personal reasons, and not by the size of the fee. I will refuse if the idea of ​​the film is not close. But if I was approached by a director whom I admire, and he specifically came to me with a role, then I conclude that it was written for me. So I can play her. The director’s personality is more important than the script, even if the role is small.”

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They are not just actors, but talented musicians. There is not a single film on their record, but one thing is certain: music is what unites them. On “The Late Late Show with James Corden,” the friends performed the musical theatrical parody “Soundtrack to Bromance,” which was filmed in one take. Perhaps this would not have happened if the actors did not know each other so well in real life.

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Childhood and youth

Matthew Page Damon was born in the town of Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, Kent Damon, worked in taxes, and his mother, Nancy Carlsson-Paige, taught elementary school at Lesley College, a private school. Matthew has an older brother, Kyle, who later became a famous sculptor.

The actor spent the first years of his life in a respectable area of ​​Boston. But when he was not yet 3 years old, his parents divorced. Matthew and Kyle returned to Cambridge with their mother and began living in an apartment building. In 1978, Matt meets Ben Affleck. The guys become best childhood friends, and later they will perform together on the same stage.

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Matt Damon in his youth
After graduating from high school, Damon entered Harvard University, where he specialized in the study of English language and literature. In addition, he attends screenwriting courses. But after 3 years of studying at Harvard, the young man decides to try his hand at acting. When he announces his desire to his mother, she does not support his idea and refuses to finance a trip to Hollywood, but does not mind if he makes this trip at his own expense.

The actor’s creative biography begins without stellar ups. Having collected $200, the guy goes to the “dream factory”, where after a while he gets a cameo role in the melodrama “Mystical Pizza”. The second one was just as tiny – a sports commentator in the film “Field of His Dreams”. Slightly disappointed, Damon returns home, graduates from university and makes a second attempt at becoming a movie star.

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With over fifteen films under their belt as actors, producers and screenwriters, the friends seem to have a strong team spirit on and off screen. We hope we will see many more of Rogan and Franco's films together and continue to enjoy their comedic talent. In addition to working on the big screen, the actors produce short films and are not averse to making social videos. They are also big fans of Hollywood house parties.

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Movies

Matt Damon received his first serious roles in the films “School Ties,” “Geronimo: An American Legend” and “Courage in Action.” All these films are united by a deep understanding of the psychology of the characters and immersion in the atmosphere of the film. Nevertheless, they did not bring much fame to the actor, and he decided to take a desperate step - he joined forces with his friend Ben Affleck.

Matt Damon (still from the movie "Good Will Hunting")

The guys together finish Matt’s student script “Good Will Hunting” and create their own project. Many studios liked the script, but they refused the authors, since Matt and Ben set the main condition - to play the main roles in the film themselves. Only Miramax Films decided to take a risk and signed a contract with beginning performers.

The film Good Will Hunting, released in 1997, created a sensation. The $10 million invested in the filming paid off many times over - the film collected more than $225 million. Awards also poured in like a cornucopia. 9 Oscar nominations - and 2 wins. Ben and Matt won the coveted statuette for best screenwriters. In addition, the duo of screenwriters received a Golden Globe, a Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and a National Board of Review Award.

Matt Damon (still from the movie "Saving Private Ryan")

After such resounding success, Damon starred in the legal film “The Benefactor” and the crime drama “Rounders.” A supporting role in Steven Spielberg's cult film Saving Private Ryan earned the actor a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination. Damon played Private James Ryan, after whom the film is named.

A year later, Matt appears in Anthony Minghella's psychological thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley. The full title of the film, shown in the credits, contains 15 epithets towards Mr. Ripley: the hero is also called yearning, musical and haunted. The film is based on the book by Patricia Highsmith, the first in a series of novels about the swindler Tom Ripley. The screen softened the cruel moments of the novel, making the hero's crimes less cold-blooded. Matt Damon portrayed the young swindler. Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow also starred.

Matt Damon (still from the film "The Talented Mr. Ripley")

Damon and Lowe were chosen for the leading roles not only due to their acting talents. Mr. Ripley pretends to be his friend Dickie, played by Lowe, so the actors had to have some physical resemblance to make such a plot device credible. Both have brown hair and regular facial features. Also, Matt and Jude have the same height – 178 cm.

His brilliant performance in the thriller “The Talented Mr. Ripley” brought the actor 5 nominations at various American film awards, including the Golden Globe and MTV Movie Awards. After this, Matt Damon will have a number of very successful roles.

In 1999, he played the fallen angel Loki in the film Dogma. Ben Affleck becomes Damon's partner in the film. The director and scriptwriter was Kevin Smith, who included “Dogma” in the unified fictional world of his films.

Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (still from the movie "Dogma")

The film has a scandalous plot: the church is rebranding, drug addicts become prophets, fallen angels are trying to outwit heavenly rules, and the characters constantly ask questions about the race, gender and orientation of the characters in sacred texts. However, the film was shown at Cannes and did not cause criticism or mass protests.

Damon then appears as golfer Rannulph Junoo in The Legend of Bager Vans and one of the conjoined twins in Stuck on You, and plays Linus Caldwell in the crime comedy Ocean's Eleven and the sequel Ocean's Twelve. In the film, “Jerry” plays one of the two main roles according to his own script.

Matt Damon (still from the film "The Bourne Identity")

Matt Damon's next acting breakthrough is his participation in the filming of The Bourne Identity, about an amnesiac former CIA officer and assassin. The film was released in 2002, was a huge commercial success and received excellent reviews from film critics. Matt will later participate in the sequels of this film - “The Bourne Supremacy” and “The Bourne Ultimatum”.

In 2006, the actor appeared in the crime thriller The Departed. The success of the project was largely due to the cast. Outwardly, Matt Damon is similar to another participant - Mark Wahlberg. The similarity is so strong that colleagues often top lists and tops of similar stars. Usually, filmmakers try not to hire performers who are similar to each other to work on a film, so as not to make the viewer confused. But Martin Scorsese, director of The Departed, was not afraid to cast both actors in key roles.

Matt Damon appears as a student of crime boss Colin Sullivan, who joins the police to spy for the benefit of the mafia. The mirror role is played by Leonardo DiCaprio: he plays the role of police academy graduate Billy Costigan, who infiltrates the mafia to collect information for the police. Jack Nicholson plays the powerful role of the mafia boss.

Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon (still from the movie "The Departed")

The film received four Oscars - for best film, editing, direction and adapted screenplay, since the plot of The Departed is based on the Hong Kong action film Double Castling.

Also worth noting is the adventure fairy-tale fantasy thriller “The Brothers Grimm”, in which Matt Damon and Heath Ledger play the famous brother storytellers, the black comedy “The Informer”, as well as the biographical drama “Invictus”, the performance of the role of Francois Pienaar in which brought the actor nominations for Oscar, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award.

In 2010, Matt starred with the Coen brothers in one of the most profitable westerns, “True Grit”: with a modest budget of $38 million, viewers reimbursed the costs in excess of $250 million. The actor played a Texas Ranger, busy searching for a dangerous killer. Josh Brolin played this role. Damon believes that even in the saddest picture there is room for a joke, but the film does little to live up to this belief. Fortunately, life did not throw up the challenges described in the script, and Matt would not want to face them and actually find out what kind of acumen he himself has.

Hailee Steinfeld and Matt Damon (still from the movie "True Grit")

The actor also remembered his young colleague Hailee Steinfeld, who had just turned 14. The Coens talked to the teenager as an equal, and the girl followed the director’s commands exactly. Damon thought that he was already an experienced actress, but it turned out that for Hayley, the role of a girl avenging her father was her first serious work.

In 2020, Matt Damon's significant work was playing the role of Mark Watney in the film adaptation of Andy Weir's famous science fiction novel The Martian. For his on-screen portrayal of an astronaut surviving alone on Mars, Matt Damon received an Empire Award and a Golden Globe and was nominated for an Oscar.

In 2020, the actor returned to the famous role of Bourne and appeared on screens in the spy action film Jason Bourne. He is also one of the film's screenwriters. The film takes place 10 years after the events of the previous part. Former agent Bourne has overcome amnesia and earns money by fighting without rules. But new details of his past work, his own recruitment and the life of Jason’s father force the hero to return to investigations and confrontation with the intelligence services. As the best thriller "Jason Bourne" was about.

Matt Damon (still from the movie "The Martian")

For “The Bourne Ultimatum,” Matt received a fee of $26 million, after which he flatly refused to continue developing this topic. And when, 9 years later, he succumbed to the persuasion of the producers, a new joke appeared in Hollywood, they say, Damon receives $1 million per phrase. There were people who calculated that in the new project, silent, as befits a special agent, Bourne utters not much more than 25 lines in an hour and a half.

The actor recalled with a shudder the torment of training and special diets he went through to gain physical shape. Boxing lessons were given by the trainer who prepared Muhammad Ali for the ring, and his wife helped with high-altitude runs. Damon's family always accompanies him on set, unless travel distracts the children from school.

Matt was unable to act in the drama Manchester by the Sea, included in the list of the best film projects of the year, but acted as a producer. He was replaced in front of the camera by Ben Affleck's brother, Casey. And again a resounding success: Casey received an Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe, and Damon was nominated for these awards as one of the creators.

Matt Damon (still from the movie "The Great Wall")

At the beginning of 2020, the world premiere of the adventure fantasy “The Great Wall” took place. The director of the film was Zhang Yimou, with whom Matt cherished the dream of working with him in his youth and 25 years later he got the chance.

Damon appeared in the film as the mercenary archer Willem. The Chinese-American film tells how European adventurers try to obtain the secret of black powder, but instead encounter terrible monsters and realize that the Great Wall of China was built to protect against the undead, and not against people from other countries.

The crime drama Suburbicon starring Damon was directed by George Clooney. “Series Hottie,” according to Matt, is a clear example of how stereotypes are broken. “Clooney did not allow himself to become resigned and confined within narrow boundaries. I worked on myself. And now everyone knows: he is an amazing director, screenwriter, producer, and not just an actor.”

Matt Damon (still from the movie "Suburbicon")

The plot of the film takes place in the 1950s. At the beginning, the city of Suburbicon looks like the embodiment of paradise and the American dream: neat houses, polite neighbors and happy families. The tone of the story changes dramatically when robbers kill Rose Lodge, the wife of Damon's hero. Gardner Lodge begins to react strangely to subsequent events, and beneath the attractive façade of city life, intrigue, blackmail and dirty secrets are revealed.

At the end of December 2017, a film was released about participants in an experiment to reduce their bodies. The ensemble cast of the fantasy comedy “In Short” included Matt Damon, Kristen Wiig, Jason Sudeikis, Christoph Waltz and Neil Patrick Harris.

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Actor Matt Damon
Damon's cameo in the crime film "Ocean's Eight" was cut out. This is how the public punished the actor for his words in support of Harvey Weinstein, who was accused of harassment. Matt stated that there is a difference between harassment and innocent touching, and he personally is willing to continue to work with such people.

The actor's character was supposed to join the ranks of heroes connecting the new film with previous films about Ocean's friends. Some fans rejoiced at the appearance of a large number of new and independent female characters who would complement the project and make it more diverse. Others defended the male cast of the crime group and believed that heroines were introduced only for the sake of social demands, and not for the sake of the plot and renewal of the franchise.

Matt had to apologize for his words, but a petition calling for Damon to be removed from Ocean's 8 gained momentum on the Internet. The film was released edited. However, director Gary Ross insisted that it was not the actor’s position, but that the character did not fit into the plot, and Matt was not the only one whose footage was deleted.

Matt Damon (still from the movie "Deadpool 2")

The actor managed to work with Steven Sodebergh, who came up with modern stories about Ocean's 11, 12 and 13 friends. Damon received a supporting role in the thriller “Unhinged”: his character helps the main character, played by Claire Foy, identify vulnerable spots in order to prevent the infiltration of a fan who is pursuing her.

It is almost impossible to recognize Matt in the action-comedy film Deadpool 2; moreover, the name of the movie star is not indicated in the credits, but Dickie Greenleaf is present. That was the name of Jude Law's character in The Talented Mr. Ripley. On the screen, Damon appeared in the complex make-up of a resident of the rural outback, with long hair and a “beer belly.”

Matt Damon movies on TV

Personal life

In high school and college, Matt dated Skylar Satenstein, who became the inspiration for the character Skylar in the movie Good Will Hunting. During 1997, he was in relationships with several famous women, such as actresses Minnie Driver and Claire Danes, his co-star in the film The Benefactor.

At a New Year's party on December 31, 1997, Damon met and began dating the famous actress Winona Ryder, but in the spring of 2000 they ended their relationship. For 2 years, Matt had an affair with Billy Bob Thornton and Ben Affleck's personal assistant, Odessa Whitmire. We separated in the fall of 2003.

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Matt Damon and his wife Luciana Barroso
In 2003, in Miami, the actor met Argentinean Luciana Barroso, who at that time was working at a local club behind the bar. The couple entered into an official marriage in December 2005, and in the summer their daughter Isabella was born. Then, with an interval of 2 years, Matt Damon became a father twice more - his wife gave birth to daughters Gia and Stella. In total, there are four children in the family - Matt is also raising Luciana’s eldest daughter Alexia.

Damon does not share details of his personal life with the general public. Photos with the actor are posted on several pages on Instagram. The accounts have thousands of subscribers, but none of them are verified. Maybe Matt is ignoring social media.

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They met on television on the comedy show “Saturday Night Live,” a program filled with a great sense of humor. As it turns out, Andy and Justin not only have that, but incredible chemistry to boot. She turned out to be so infectious that the friends decided to work on joint projects - they released several short films and starred in the films “Friendship Sex” and “Pop Star”, and also appeared in the Motherlover music video in the company of Susan Sarandon and Patricia Clarkson.

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Matt Damon now

The premiere of the sports drama “Daring Challenge” (“Ford v Ferrari”) is planned for July 2020, in which Matt, along with Jon Bernthal and Christian Bale, has the main role. The actor plays an American racing driver and designer of racing cars that competed with the Italian auto industry.

Embed from Getty Images Matt Damon in 2020

According to press reports, Damon is vying for the role of billionaire Marc Rich, the founder of the company, who became famous as one of the most successful black gold traders. The drama “King of Oil” will tell the story of his rise to the top of the business Olympus and the collapse that occurred after the authorities brought charges of tax evasion.

Old friends Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are producing the series City on a Hill, which focuses on the criminal underworld of Boston in the mid-90s and is based on true events. Another project of the creative tandem, confirmed by facts, is a drama about rigging the results of prize draws at McDonald's. Affleck is directing the film, with Damon playing the lead role of a swindler who comes up with a deceptive scheme.

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