Fact: Everyone wants to ask actor Ben Affleck what life is like with his pop icon fiancée Jennifer Lopez.
Fact No. 2: Affleck would rather talk about his acting career, especially his latest role as Marvel Comic superhero Daredevil.
At a recent Pasadena, Calif., press conference on behalf of Daredevil, Affleck talked openly about Lopez. He also made a point to discuss his past acting choices and the extra preparation needed to play comic character Matt Murdock, a blind lawyer who becomes the crime fighter Daredevil at night thanks to enhanced senses. Below are some of Affleck's comments about playing a blind superhero and acting in the spotlight that didn't make it into the main Daredevil story. Why? Well, like everyone else, it's Ben's private life with Lopez that really grabs our attention. For the rest of you serious-minded Affleck admirers, these questions and answers are for you.
CityBeat: What was it like playing a blind man?
Ben Affleck: What's interesting about it as opposed to, you look at Red Dragon where Emily Watson, who I thought did a great job, and I watched her in that playing a blind character. And Pacino did it famously and won the Oscar for Scent of a Woman. There's a high bar for playing blind people that's out there. The interesting thing about this, while he's (Matt Murdock) blind with his eyes, because of his super powers, he has this advanced hearing that allows him to create this three-dimensional map using sonar of his surroundings. He's not, in the way we think of people being blind, technically blind. So a lot of times as Matt Murdock, it's kind of an act, a play at being more helpless than he really is.
CB: Daredevil allows a criminal to die in the film. Did you support that change from the comic?
BA: The really hardcore fans, myself included, and I think probably even Marvel, felt that (director Mark Steven Johnson) was stepping over a line in a way. We went back and forth on that many times. Ultimately, we decided to keep it in there. That's the one way that it deviates from the heart of the book, where Daredevil never kills anybody. He does that Bullseye drop in the comic book and in this one we throw him out the window. That's very consistent with the comic but he was not as vengeful as we portrayed him in the beginning. For the sake of giving the character an arc, from letting him go from being a guy who's ultimately seeking vengeance to a guy who understands the difference between that and justice, understands about mercy and compassion, largely through the love of this woman. There's part of me that's ambivalent about it; that feels because it is the most significant departure from the tenor and tone of the comic book itself, which is the thing I wanted to be the most faithful to. But I do think it works in the context of the movie -- I think ultimately because he's not the Punisher. He's not a guy who's a vigilante, who shoots bad guys and kills them in the comic. Ultimately, that's not where he ends up. Where Daredevil ends up at the end of this movie is very consistent with who he is in the comics.
CB: You describe yourself as a huge Daredevil fan. What is it about the character that appeals to you?
BA: I don't really know. I know when I was kid there was a contrast between that hero (Daredevil) and others in the spectrum of this comic book universe, many of whom were kind of very chaste, boy scout, black-and-white golden age '50s comic book heroes that were very predictable and you always knew they would do the right thing. They were fighting intergalactic foes and it was fun in a kind of little kid way but it was never something I could identify with. As I got into pre-adolescence and adolescence, this guy, Daredevil, represented something to me that I guess was more realistic. It's always funny to say that about a guy who's outside in a red suit and fights crime at night, but it was, like, he was a flawed hero. He had his own struggles. He was openly religious. He had these tragic love affairs. He struggled with himself as much as he struggled with the rest of the world. He didn't always win. He didn't always do the right thing and I guess that resonated with me more.
CB: So how do you prepare yourself as an actor to play somebody as extreme as a superhero?
BA: You do movies like this and they take place in this alternative universe and this one is unique in the comic book movie adaptation pantheon. While it has this tonal thing of people dressing up in costumes and fighting crime and super-villains and stuff, there's a dual tone because there's also an element of realism that's not tongue in cheek. It dares to ask the audience to take the characters seriously and to really get invested in their emotional journey, which could be absurd. So you have to invest yourself in it and be convinced of it. That was hard for me because it's a little far afield from my everyday life: putting on a costume and fighting crime and people getting stabbed. One of the things that I could identify with this movie was what's at the center of it in some ways, which is the love story and the transforming power of love and the redemptive qualities that falling in love has. Without going into too much detail, I can tell you that's a thing that I could identify with and I used as an actor as the centerpiece to hold onto. When I'm trying to think what this is like in my life and I can't think of anything.
CB: People magazine picked you as the sexiest man alive. Any comments?
BA: People magazine called my mother first and she told me, 'People magazine called me and said that you were the sexiest man alive.' I was like, 'Mom, that might be a prank,' and she said, 'No it's not and I just want to tell you that it's ridiculous.' I told her, 'I'm sure there will be people sharing your opinion Mom.' Then, she said, 'Don't get a big head!' and that's my feeling about the sexiest man alive.
CB: One last question about Jennifer. Your movie with her, Gigli, opens this summer. Are people afraid you'll break up before it opens?
BA: People are always afraid you'll break up. Publicists panic any time actors get involved with each other. They just want you to stay together until the premiere, you know. I don't know. We'll see how this movie does ... I would love to (work with Lopez) again. If it's not, then no one will want us to work together again. If it is, they'll have an endless appetite until one does not work.
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