The glitch in the Matrix has allowed us to travel back to 2003, at the height of Bennifermania. Not only that, the Matrix is so glitchy, we’re getting a revival of ‘90s-style stories. Ben Affleck and Matt Damon used to be best friends and super-close. While they’re still friends, they don’t live in each other’s pockets anymore and haven’t for some time. Nowadays, Matt is happy to spend all of his social time with Chris Hemsworth and Elsa Pataky. So that’s why Matty D had not heard anything about the revival of OG Bennifer. Matt spoke about them on the Today Show:
One of Ben Affleck’s closest Hollywood pals is weighing in on his possible rekindled romance with Jennifer Lopez. Matt Damon, who has been friends with Affleck, 48, since childhood, appeared on Today Tuesday morning and was asked by co-hosts Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb about the Justice League actor recently spending time with the singer, 51, whom he was engaged to nearly two decades ago.
“There’s not enough liquor in the world for you to get me to say something about that,” Damon, 50, jokingly told the co-hosts. After Damon tried to remain coy about Affleck and Lopez’s current status, Kotb, 56, questioned the Ocean’s 13 actor, who is currently in Australia, about how he learned about the recent news regarding the two.
“I just heard you guys. I was sitting here waiting to come on TV,” said Damon. “This is the first time I’ve heard about it.”
“What did you think?” Guthrie, 49, then asked.
“It’s a fascinating story,” Damon responded, which earned laughs from Kotb and Guthrie.
Damon then gave a quick reaction to the reunion news and said, “I hope it’s true. I love them both. I hope it’s true. That would be awesome.”
Damon’s comments come just after Lopez and Affleck enjoyed a days-long trip to Montana. The exes were first spotted together outside her Los Angeles home in late April.
“She had a great time with Ben,” a source told PEOPLE of their getaway. “She is happy with him and enjoys spending time with him.”
“I love them both”?? Hm… maybe it’s just as simple as that. Maybe Matty D is taking the same perspective as me: it’s fun, maybe it will be good for both of them, and hey, they both know what they’re doing. Everyone’s an adult, everyone’s consenting, and it’s fun for gossip at every level, even among celebrities. I always thought that Matt was anti-J.Lo back in the day, like all of Ben’s bros were like “she’s changing you, bruh, she’s a ball and chain.” Seventeen years later, maybe they see everything differently.
“I love them both. I hope it’s true. That would be awesome.” -Matt Damon on speculation that Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck have rekindled their relationship pic.twitter.com/GPbmZX9fQT
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) May 11, 2021
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
Fun indeed! Bring it!
And, who is the woman in the red dress in the pic second from the bottom? Not Jennifer!?
It’s Matt Damon and his wife.
I feel like Matt Damon is all of us right now – have fun, its awesome, enjoy yourselves.
I have a new theory about all of this though which some mentioned yesterday – that there is nothing romantic happening between them, they are just good friends hanging out, but they both 100% know what this is doing to the tabloids and the gossip sites etc and that’s part of the intention.
Of course they could end up married in 6 months, lol.
Yeah sure, I think that sounds plausible. It’s such celeb gossip gold, and they’re both pretty media savvy that I would not be surprised.
Sometimes I see some angry comments and I wonder why people are that upset that two fifty something year olds may or may not be banging. This is fun gossip, just enjoy it for what it is.
Yeah, I don’t get it either.
I honestly haven’t seen angry comments, but maybe you mean somewhere other than Celebitchy. (I mostly stay off Twitter, for example.)
I do think there’s a difference between people who think “this is probably staged” and being angry about it. Ben is coming off a relationship with Ana, and while I believe the relationship was real, it had a lot of performative aspects to it for the media. So I can see why some people would see him as the kind of guy who would fake a relationship.
I agree! sometimes the same saying, there is no difference at all, but a common person saying it and a famous person saying it will have a huge difference!
Matt Damon has a place at the Yellowstone Club. Not sure I buy he didn’t know.
Right. We all here on celebitchy have been talking about this for what, two weeks? I really doubt he “just found out.”
Sure Matt!
@Abby … Matt Damon has moved his family back to New York (Brooklyn, I think) and he, Lucia, and their family spend a lot of time with Chris, Elsa, and their family. It’s entirely possible that he didn’t know.
@Kaiser … What I recall Matty saying about the Jennifer Lopez relationship back in the day is that she didn’t pass the full ‘family/friends’ test–whatever that was. And it wasn’t Jennifer he didn’t like back then, it was the ‘daily front-page-paparazzi-full-press-celebrity’ that came alone with Jennifer, which Damon thought was bad for Ben.
Matt Damon and his family own a place in Brooklyn, it’s the most expensive domicile in Brooklyn. They don’t live there and never really have, I don’t think, its just a crash pad. They’ve been in Australia since the beginning of the year and they were in CA before that and Ireland before that.
@Cava24 … Matt has put his Pacific Palisades house in Los Angeles on the market for $21 million. He and his family now live at the Brooklyn home full-time. Matty bought the Brooklyn property, the top two floors of the old Standish Hotel, at the end of 2018.
https://local12.com/news/around-the-web/matt-damon-pacific-palisades-mansion-on-the-market-for-21-million-los-angeles-california-ben-affleck#:~:text=They%20moved%20their%20families%20together,the%20market%20for%20%2421%20million.
@Yvette – he was in Byron Bay Australia for the interview he did today-
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-9568561/Byron-pub-stays-open-especially-Matt-Damon-interviewed-TV-Ben-Affleck.html
He may or may not actually live in Brooklyn at some point. He may buy a new place in California. There are rumors he bought a place in Byron, I have no idea if that is true.
@ Yvette, thanks for the link to the house, which is gorgeous, BTW.
He’s Affleck’s friend so not allowed to say he knew or didn’t know, I guess. Confirming they’re on romantically would be putting himself up as an “official PR voice” of sorts for the showmance.
That’s how I took it…he’s just kicking the can down the road. Can’t blame him.
+1
Nah. Matt just seems to have distanced himself from Ben in recent years. Even built himself a different friendship circle. I doubt they check in with each other frequently and I suspect most of their interaction these days is about potential film projects. Friends outgrow each other and I don’t think Matt’s wife was too excited about her husband being besties with Ben immediately after his split from his wife. He was wiling out too biggly. I’m not even sure Matt has ever been mentioned in the intervention stories.
I don’t think this is true. Matt Damon was photographed at Ben’s house many times after the Ana De Armas break-up. Of course, they both travel a lot so it’s very likely they don’t hang out as much as they used to.
Whatever they are up to, I like it.
So I’ve been wracking my brain to trying to think of how Ben got to be at Vaxlive.i reckon there must have been some background manoeuvre going on. We know M&H had lunch with Jen &Arod when they first got to the states. This morning I was listening to a podcast with Ben on it where he was talking about the media madness surrounding Bennifer 1.0 and he was on stage receiving his Oscar with George Clooney ! Bam made the connection, Jennifer was also in a movie with GC.
To Kaiser point about Matt I too got the vibe he wasn’t all in the first time around I hope this time he keeps. His opinions locked up and Ben can man up and weather whatever storm is coming this time around. Since he has been pretty miserable for 17years
I don’t understand your thought process here. Ben was at Vax Live because he knew George Clooney who knew Jen who knew Harry and Meghan? I’m sure it was much less complicated than that.
I don’t think he’s been miserable for 17 years. There was clearly at least a 5 – 7 year period in which he was sober and staying put. And also wasnt he wiling out badly during the final year of Bennifer. Wouldn’t set a wedding date, looked miserable in interviews, was gambling like crazy, was being spotted in strip clubs, cheated hence the wedding be called off last minute. I think people have romantasized that period to the extreme. Or they only remember the initial phase where he was the most devoted boyfriend on earth – which he has done recently with Ana and Lindsay. It never lasts. He’s brain works against his happiness.
Ben sabotages himself and his relationships. It’s the behavior of an addict who can’t stay sober. There’s no way this will last, but the gossip stories are fun.
Matt knows exactly what’s going on. I always got the impression that he was not a big fan of Ben/Jennifer G. the families did things together but not a lot. Matt’s wife looks way more friendly with Chris H’s wife. They do a lot of Couple things.
I don’t think he was a fan with JLo either. Didn’t he blame her for all the grief Ben got from being with her?
Garner is such a drip. Of course Lucy Damon has more fun with Elsa Hemsworth. Can’t even imagine Garner hanging out with that group.
They are hanging out with Ghislaine Mawell’s ex, Ted Waitt, founder of Gateway while in Byron. Matt and his wife have been close to him for years.
I think she seems like a lot of fun from her IG and her Hot Ones interviews. I didn’t understand it before because I bought the silly tabloid narrative but she’s the kind of bubbly ball of unashamedly goofy fun every friend group should have. Also Elsa and Matt’s wife have a lot in common being both Hispanic stay at home wives to big anglo stars.
What does the ‘OG’ stand for in OG Bennifer? Halp.
OG “original” Bennifer: JLo and Ben
Bennifer 2.0 was with Jen Garner
Oh thank you Ari 🙂 hadn’t heard that expression for original before cheers
It stands for “original gangster.”
Of course Matt knows. It’s kind of laughable to think he didn’t know just because that’s what he said on a morning talk show. Those two are lifelong best friends, regardless of what other friendships they have in their lives. I think Matt definitely took an anti-JLo tone back in the day, but there’s no way he’s going to make similar comments now. He’s going to be much more careful this time around.
I think Matt is being sarcastic.
Matt and Ben are still tight. Before he went to Australia a few months ago, Matt was getting papped at Ben’s house a few times a week. They were Ireland together all last summer to film The Last Duel and wrote it together. Seems like Matt’s wife Luciana, who clearly didn’t vibe with Jen G, would be on a similar wavelength to JLo.
I remember an interview from a few years back where he basically blamed Jennifer Lopez for the problems Ben went through during their relationship. Maybe he’s mellowed since then, but he seems kind of full of it to me.
He probably blamed Jennifer Garner, too. That would explain why the couples didn’t really bond.
Ben has a bad habit of blaming women for his problems. It’s an easy way to self-excuse his alcohol and gambling addictions, his promiscuity and the huge failure of movies like Gigli. I hope he’s done a lot of introspective self-examination and tried to right the wrongs he’s done. Both he and Casey are damaged goods — their father was a nightmare alcoholic and abuser so you could probably fill a textbook with their various psychological and emotional problems.
I think we should leave Garner out of this. She tried her damndest to deal with Ben for the sake of their children and @Hannah calling her a “drip” is unnecessarily harsh.
Boo hoo! She’s a drip.
@ Jaded, I agree that we should leave Jennifer G. out of this because she really tried so hard with him. She was hellbent on saving Ben and their marriage. Jennifer G has nothing but support from me, after what Ben put her through.
In regards to the Today show, who does that? Why does the Today show still exist? I watched it once and hated it!!
No way does Damon know nothing about this. No matter where Damon lives he and Affleck are connecting on the regular. Texting if nothing else. I think Damon and Affleck were both messy and leaky AF with press about their personal relationships — and each other’s — back in the day and hopefully they have both learned to keep a tight lid on that realm of their lives. I can see Damon at least getting a lot smarter about that as he has aged. Affleck tends towards the messy and the drama, so we will just have to see.
Hindsight is 20/20. Matt WAS anti-J.Lo when she was with Ben. But a LOT has happened since that time including Ben getting married and getting divorced. And I think Ben married Jen Garner because she was the safe choice and she was always more in love with him than he was with her. And I can see Matt after all these years recognizing that maybe J.Lo is Ben’s white whale. The one that got away.
Lol Mat had to go to the gaming room at the local pub to get decent wifi for his live cross. Welcome to Australia! Our beaches are great but our internet sucks. But yeah I know that Byron pub well and it serves a top beer off the tap