The Matt Damon Column - October 2004 Archive

Updated 10/28/2004

Congratulations Red Sox!

Calendar

Syriana

The Bourne Supremacy

Ocean's Twelve

Syriana

The Brothers Grimm

10/28/2004

The Boston Red Sox have won the World Series, but Matt did not attend the games in Boston or St Louis due to the filming of Syriana.

Remember Matt's recent quote in Vitals magazine about how much he hates celebs using a mobile phone at baseball games because they are wasting the best seats in the house? From the Boston Herald - recent comments about Ben Affleck's behaviour at an earlier game:

BTW, spies in Ben's row said he was on his cell phone all night long - and at one point had two cell phones going.

He would stop once in a while to "scream and yell" at the players, then get back on the phone again.
New photos from Ocean's Twelve are at this site.
Matt's been nominated in the category of Best Male Action Star in the People's Choice Awards (a mindless survey of who's popular right now). You can vote at the official site.
And here's a link to one of the many stories at the moment which question whether Ben's career is dead temporarily or permanently.

10/23/2004

Photos of Matt and Amanda Peet on the Syriana set at the Jardin Anglais, Geneva, are at right. Filming in Geneva finishes Saturday and the crew will then move to Dubai, UAE. Details from Le Matin and tdg.ch.
In an interview transcribed at this Paul Bettany fansite, Paul and Willem Dafoe talk about the Syriana script, and their doubts that it would ever get made:

PAUL: Well, have you noticed that the scripts going around at the moment are really bad? I love entertainment films - things that are pure entertainment - but there doesn't seem to be anything else out there. I find it odd: I sit and read whatever superhero script, and then I read in the paper about Fallujah. Not to sound too pretentious, but it's so disparate. There's nothing addressing that reality. Actually, there are a couple of things. There's a brilliant script I read called Syriana. It's really good. [The film was written by Stephen Gaghan, who won an Oscar in 2000 for writing Traffic.]

WILLEM: Yeah, I read it. But that's something that'll never get made.

PAUL: They say it's going to. [Paul's right: It's already in production. George Clooney and Matt Damon are starring]

WILLEM: I'll believe it when I see it.
The Boston Herald tried to track down their local stars for a reaction after the final game Red Sox victory this week:

Damon, who attended Game 2 of the ALCS series before flying off to Europe, is in Switzerland filming "Syriana." And if you think you were suffering from a Game 7 hangover yesterday, Matt tuned into the action in the middle of the night and then had to be on the movie set the next morning!
The final Ocean's Twelve trailer is at yahoo movies. And producer Jerry Weintraub has been talking about the premiere and upcoming world promotion, summarised at contactmusic:

O12 treat for globe-trotting stars

The stars of Ocean's Twelve are set for the ultimate pampering experience as they trek around the globe promoting the sequel - their private jet will feature bedrooms, the finest champagne and a masseuse.

George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Matt Damon join producer Jerry Weintraub on the plane, which will take off from Los Angeles for a whistle-stop world tour immediately after attending the Hollywood premiere party.

And the premiere itself looks like being a one-of-a-kind event. Producer Weintraub says, "We're closing down Hollywood Boulevard like the Academy Awards, and we're having a red carpet that's being satellited around the world."
From an article at the Hollywood Reporter about December DVD releases possibly giving their films an Oscar boost:

Universal's "The Bourne Supremacy" arrives in DVD Dec. 7. It, too, was a very well-reviewed film that awards voters are likely to have already seen (considering that it's grossed about $174 million domestically). However, its performances by Matt Damon, Franka Potente, Brian Cox, Julia Stiles, Karl Urban, Gabriel Mann and Joan Allen will all benefit from getting a second look. Its bonus features include a look at how Damon prepared physically for the challenges of his role and there are behind-the-scenes pieces on how the filmmakers shot key sequences like a chase through a Moscow tunnel and a daring dive from a bridge to a barge. There's also a commentary by director Paul Greengrass and a feature about scoring the film with composer John Powell. How can being able to see all this do anything but enhance "Bourne's" potential for nominations?
A further quote about Ben's future plans to write with Matt, from Dark Horizons.

Question: Are you and Damon going to get together and write again, or is this the end of that?
Ben Affleck: I would like to, we would like to but we both just keep working in movies.

Question: So your writing project is postponed indefinitely?
Ben Affleck: No, I just adapted a book that I just turned into Paramount by Dennis Lahane, called Gone Baby Gone. I just finished that. I actually have to do another step on it, so it's not really finished, but I did the second draft so I'm doing that. I'll definitely write something else with Matt.
For some of the most scathing reviews of Ben's new film, try these ones: Sun Sentinel, Herald, and the NY Daily News.

10/18/2004

Here's the first photo of Matt on the set of Syriana in Geneva, from Le Matin. There are two long articles about the first day of filming, with translated excerpts below - the other article is from tdg.ch.

[Filming took place at a trading room] It is there that Matt Damon went yesterday afternoon. Arriving at 2.30pm, the actor sat in the office of his character, Bryan Woodman, negotiating an oil trade. During the scene, the actor is on the telephone when he is asked whether it is necessary to accept an invitation to go to Marbella. In the film, the sequence will hardly exceed one minute. It required a whole afternoon of filming. Dressed in the regulation uniform of the traders (dark costume, blue tie on shirt of the same color), Matt Damon repeated the scene a good ten times. A second scene was turned in the corridor of the third floor of the same bank.

In an excellent mood on this working Sunday in October, Matt Damon joked with the personnel of the bank present. He even lent himself willingly to a quick photo session.
A rough translated look at the upcoming filming locations in Geneva, with the French original text below:

English Garden and the hill/side of Cologny... If the program is maintained, the next scenes should take place at the President-Wilson Hotel, in a cemetery (that of the Kings?), with the English Garden, in the Rues-Basses and at Cologny for the Woodman family home (played by Matt Damon and Amanda Peet).

Si le programme est respecté, les prochaines scènes devraient avoir lieu à l'Hôtel Président-Wilson, dans un cimetière (celui des Rois?), au Jardin anglais, dans les Rues-Basses et du côté de Cologny pour la Maison des Woodman (incarnés par Matt Damon et Amanda Peet).
More details from the other newspaper (my rough translation):

In the buildings of the Private Banking Union (UBP) in the downtown area, two film sets with thirty people are preparing two different stages, accomodated by Matt Damon. The American star plays Bryan Woodman, young boss of the establishment, living in Geneva with his wife and children. His office is enclosed, separated from the hubbub which usually fills the trading room.

The team for "Syriana", 150 people, remains in Geneva all week. The indoor scenes, in Cologny, are envisaged tomorrow, in a villa overlooking the lake. It is there that Matt Damon and the beautiful Amanda Peet, his wife in the film, will live. Then filming will move to Gstaad in a few days, before all the production and the actors move to Dubai.
From the Boston Globe:

Hats off to this Damon

Still, we deceive. Being Matt Damon's publicist, Jennifer Allen says she routinely reads bogus stories about the movie star. But rarely, if ever, does the actor dignify these falsehoods with a response. "He doesn't let that stuff bother him," she said. But when the Cambridge-bred actor read in this space last week that he'd arrived at Yankee Stadium wearing a green ballcap, he just had to call. A diehard Sox fan, Damon wanted everyone to know that he risked life and limb to wear a Sox cap to the stadium. (It was his friend and fellow actor, Casey Affleck, who, lacking the courage of his convictions, wore the green hat.) So why, if he's such a big booster, did Damon sit out the Boston massacre Saturday? He was in Berlin for the premiere of "The Bourne Supremacy." Anyway, Allen said her client will catch plenty of the Olde Towne Team next year when he and Leonardo DiCaprio are in Boston for six months shooting "The Departed" with Martin Scorsese "He's looking forward to it," she said. So are we.
From the New York Times about the unknown crop of Oscar candidates this year:

The studios, as usual, will be pushing their epics, like "Alexander'' from Warner Brothers Entertainment unit of Time Warner. But this year is uncertain enough that industry executives are even suggesting that popular films like "Spider-Man 2," released by Columbia Pictures, and "The Bourne Supremacy," from Universal Pictures, might compete for best-picture nominations.
More Bourne Supremacy premiere photos from Berlin are here, and there's another article from yahoo - translated.

Damon is Kerry fan

Berlin (AP) Hollywood star Matt Damon would give a lot so that John Kerry becomes the new US President. "I would pay one million dollars to have Kerry in the White House", said Damon, who had come on Saturday evening to the German premiere of his new film "The Bourne Supremacy" in Berlin. The acting president George W. Bush is responsible for the fact that more than one million jobs were destroyed.

However Damon did not remain overnight in the capital. Directly after the premiere he flew to Switzerland.

The fact that many regard him as a sex symbol Damon attributes not to his exterior, but to his success in films. Formerly he went into bars and nobody looked twice. Only after he was seen in films was he given this image, he says.

Damon betrayed one secret. "I love chocolate", he says. Above all he eats Nutella happily by the spoonful. The German spread is at the top of his list: "I like it and love German beer."
And a long report about the premiere is at Bunte - partly translated below.

It was autumnal cool at the German premiere of "The Bourne Supremacy" on Saturday evening in Berlin. But despite the uncomfortable temperatures hundreds of fans had come to the Sony Center at the Potsdamer Place in order to be close to the stars. At 19.30 o'clock it was time: Hollywood star Matt Damon (34) and Franka Potente (30) entered nearly at the same time on the red carpet.

She was in a green satin dress, dark stockings and coat, he was completely simple in a dark suit and light blue shirt. "I am pleased, again, to be back in Berlin", explained Matt Damon and smiled smartly as always.

For Matt Damon it was to be a short visit in Berlin. "I will fly today still to Switzerland, because I must be up tomorrow morning by six o'clock for filming", explained the Oscar winner. On Friday the US star had arrived in the city and spent the night in the Hotel Adlon. Not alone: "I have brought my friend to Berlin with me", Damon told T-Online. To the premiere, Luciana Barroso did not come however.

10/17/2004

Matt, Franka, Karl Urban, director Paul Greengrass and producer Paul Crowley have attended the Berlin premiere of The Bourne Supremacy. Matt flew in from Geneva and has already returned to the Syriana set in Switzerland; meanwhile Franka and Karl did all the press duties.
Interviews or reports about the trip with German publications are at Morgenpost and BZ, including the following Q&A (translated):

Do you believe that you could become as agent Jason Bourne the American equivalent of the English James Bond?

I cannot answer that yet. In any case a third part is already in discussions, and if it becomes a whole series, and the role is then played by others, I hope I will be able to say one day: Matt Damon was the Sean Connery among the Bourne actors.
The pictures of George Clooney (and even Matt's bodyguard but no Matt) on the Moroccan set of Syriana are at The Z Review.
Ben Affleck's distancing from Matt contines - he's now completed the adaptation of a book he and Matt were going to adapt together and is talking about writing solo again. Matt has said many times that he will only ever write with Ben. From about.com:

You've talked about doing some more writing. When are you going to do it?

I just adapted a Dennis Lehane book. I just turned it in, which I'm really excited about. He wrote "Mystic River." And this was called, "Gone, Baby, Gone." And that was really fun. I had two months by myself in the office writing. It's gotten me inspired to write something original. Maybe I'll do that soon.
And Ben also seems to be re-stating history - from the above interview:

What advice do you have for college students who are trying to break into the business?

You're wasting your money on college. I swear to God. I went to college at Occidental College and I gave them so much money. I tried to turn in 20 pages of a screenplay in my creative writing class. The woman wouldn't take it. I stood up, walked out, never went back to that school, never gave them another dime. That script turned into "Good Will Hunting." How do you like me now??? (laughing)
The final poster for Ocean's Twelve is available at JoBlo.

10/15/2004

In the latest copy of Who magazine (Australian version of People) there are four pictures of George Clooney on the set of Syriana in Morocco on 6 October, but none of Matt who was also there but just out of shot. One of the captions to the pictures:

Clooney may look weathered and scruffy, but he hasn't changed his prank-loving ways. The actor broke up the serious atmosphere on the set of Syriana by throwing chunks of bread at his serial co-star Matt Damon (who was happy to return the favour). Next up for the globetrotting cronies: filming in Switzerland.
Also in Who is the picture of Matt and Lucy at Crobar from last week, with the following caption (although its veracity really should not be trusted):

The day before his 34th birthday, Matt Damon celebrated with girlfriend Luciana Barroso. "They seemed like they're soulmates," a friend said after spending time with the pair at a charity golf tournament last month. "I know it sounds ridiculous. But it seems they just go together so easily and comfortably."
More about Matt's birthday celebrations from the Miami Herald:

Over in Hollywood at the übersexy Nikki Marina last Thursday night was Matt Damon, who arrived by yacht -- the All Axcess -- with about 20 people, including his Miami girlfriend, Luciana Barroso. Damon and co. threw back some Heinekens before leaving for crobar.
One of yesterday's German articles has now been translated and picked up by Ananova.

Matt and Ben 'to grow old together'

Matt Damon has admitted that he'll probably grow old with Ben Affleck rather than the woman of his dreams.

Speaking to German magazine Brigitte Damon said he believed in his long term friendship with Affleck and added: "I can well imagine growing old with him."

He also said that it was unlikely a woman would come between them. "My longest relationship with a woman lasted two and a half years. That's very short when I consider how long I've been friends with Ben," he said.

The actor, who wrote and starred in Good Will Hunting together with Affleck, also stood by his best mate during his engagement and subsequent break-up to Jennifer Lopez.

"Despite all the rumours I liked and still do like Jennifer Lopez. I would never judge the woman at Ben's side and expect the same from him," said Damon.
Another South Park movie justification (or so they claim) from the film's creators is at coming soon:

CS!: Who did the voice for Matt Damon?
Parker: Actually, we both did.
Stone: We both did parts, but that's not a very tough voice. Anyone could have done that one.
Parker: The way that happened was funny, too. That wasn't in the script. We started getting the puppet molds back for the actors, but you can only use one skull that these faces go over, so sometimes you'd get a puppet that looked close and sometimes you just didn't. I remember the Matt Damon one we were supposed to shoot that day, and the puppeteers came down and were like "Here's Matt Damon!" and we were like "Dude! That doesn't look like Matt Damon! He looks retarded!" Honestly, out of all those people, we've met Matt Damon before, and he's actually a pretty cool guy and a talented actor. It's just because his puppet was screwed up that he got voiced that way.
Stone: It just shows that it's totally not personal.
And again from ABC.

"We actually like Matt Damon, and we like his movies," says Parker. "When the puppet of him was made, it was like, 'This looks nothing like Matt Damon.' So we turned it into that."

10/14/2004

Matt attended Ggame 2 of the Red Sox v Yankees series in NY yesterday, and photographs are from yahoo and Goff. A short interview was at the Boston Herald:

Celebs give Bronx cheer

Red Sox superfan Matt Damon blew into the Bronx last night to hold up the celebrity cheering section for the Olde Towne Team - in the heart of enemy territory.

Damon, who sat through the 3-1 Sox loss with "Ocean's Twelve" co-star Casey Affleck, shared his thoughts with us on his way out. "Oh, of course I'm disappointed," Damon said before quickly asking, "Have you heard anything new about Curt Schilling? I feel so bad for him. That's all he wanted to do was to play in this series and the guy gets hurt.'"

Alas, Damon will not be at his beloved Fenway this weekend, since he heads overseas to shoot his new thriller, "Syriana."
Matt, Franka Potente, Paul Greengrass and possibly Charlize Theron will attend the Berlin premiere of The Bourne Supremacy Saturday night in Berlin. The premiere will be at the Cinestar on Potsdamer Platz commencing at 7.00pm.
Amongst the many German articles around at the moment are interviews with Matt here, here and here, an interview with Claudio Maniscalco (who plays the Italian Customs officer) is here. A translated version of an answer from the first interview linked:

Teleschau: How does it feel to be one of the top stars in Hollywood?

Damon: I've landed again on the A-list of Hollywood actors. I noticed that however only when Terry Giliam talked to me about the main role in The Brothers Grimm and offered it to me. I couldn't believe my ears and could hardly believe my luck. He told me that he was given a list. Someone had told him from these ten or so to select who he would like, and the film would supposedly be a certain success.

I asked Terry only: "Why the devil isn't Johnny Depp on the list?" Because he is an avowed friend of Gilliam's. Gus van Sant would come immediately to me. Everyone has their relationships with directors with whom they have had good experiences before. But Terry was completely honest with me and admitted that I was his second choice. But I was more than content. This list anyway is constantly changing. I never saw it. It is a genuine myth.

10/10/2004

A larger size pic of Matt and Lucy at Crobar, presumably taken late in the night, was at People online.
Expect a few comments around 'puppet' Matt's appearance in the upcoming South Park movie - explained in this Boston Globe article:

Apologies to Matt Damon.

The "South Park" guys, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, don't actually think he's an idiot. The opposite, in fact. But the look-alike they made to play him in their new, all-marionette movie didn't look quite right. The result: Matt Damon as moron, a standout of stupidity among the Hollywood liberals sent up on strings in "Team America: World Police."

As Parker explained, "Unfortunately for Matt, what happened was we got the puppets back and we were like, 'That doesn't look like Matt Damon. He looks retarded -- dude, he looks totally retarded. What are we going to do?' We're like, 'Well, let's make him retarded... I really do sort of despise Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon and Sean Penn way more. It's just how the Matt Damon puppet turned out. So, sorry, Matt."

By Hollywood standards, the two are low-key, although they work in that John Stamos is a pal and that George Clooney is a good guy. Matt Damon, too, meaning they've met them all. Then again, they know they may have burned bridges with "Team America." Ben Affleck has an entire song devoted to his inability to act.

10/9/2004

Photos of Matt and Lucy celebrating Matt's birthday early at Miami's Crobar on Thursday are at wiremage and below, with Tommy Karas.
Matt's interview in Cosmopolitan magazine is in November's US issue, and it is the reverse of the main Sarah Michelle Gellar cover.
I have transcribed in full the text of Matt's interview in Playboy magazine, which was in the August US issue. It is available on this separate Playboy Interview page. I hope the usual suspects will not copy certain parts of the interview and criticise them for their own purposes. All readers please note that the interview is now about six months old, and comments made therein were provided for a specific publication and in a specific context. A few quotes:

PLAYBOY: In an interview in 1997, the year GWH was released, you sounded especially pumped about the minibar in your hotel room. Seven years later we're sitting in this grand hotel suite with a sumptuous spread of food and drink. Have you become blase about the perks of fame?

DAMON: I've lived in a lot of hotels since then. One fear I honestly have - and it's something I talk about to my family a lot - is that I don't want to experience this bizarre life. I try to be vigilant about ways in which it's changing me. There's the stuff I'm aware of, and then there's the stuff I'm not aware of, which is why people who've known me a long time play a huge role in my life. You want somebody to say, "Dude, you fucking used to live for the minibar, and now you just take it for granted."

PLAYBOY: How does keeping a close watch on yourself affect your relationships, especially with women?

DAMON: The bigger fear is that you won't want to participate in intimate relationships because they push back at you and superficial relationships don't. If you're a movie star, then they really don't push back at you. Someone's usually just happy you're talking to them, which means you can walk around having meaningless encounters with just about everybody and live with the perception that you're the greatest guy in the world, without having anything or anyone close to you. Whether you're famous or not, close relationships require work. You still have to participate, be there and get called on your shit. It's easy to say, "You've called me on my shit. I don't want to talk to you anymore. I want to go have a drink down at the bar, where the guys say, "Oh, you're great, just a regular guy." I don't want you telling me that I've got to fucking clean up after myself." So the real thing is not to take that hall pass to great guy-dom, which is really superficial in the end.

PLAYBOY: But you still got the part. For Courage Under Fire you put yourself on a crash diet so extreme you nearly caused serious physical damage. Do you have residual health problems?

DAMON: It's not necessarily a scientific theory, but from a young age I've put myself in really high-pressure situations. After that movie, one of the medications they put me on was an anti-anxiety drug, Klonopin, because I had started to have symptoms such as blurry vision and hot flashes. Sitting in the waiting room of this great doctor at Massachusetts General Hospital, I read this article he happened to have written, I think for the New England Journal of Medicine, on exaggerated stress response. By the time I got through the first page, all the blood had gone out of my face. I walked into the doctor's office holding the article and said, "This is me."

PLAYBOY: And was it?

DAMON: Every single symptom. He asked how incredibly high-pressure situations like doing a movie affected me, and I said, "I don't fucking care. I deal with it." He told me, "It will manifest itself in another way. Your vision is blurry, you're having hot flashes. You're not okay." He said that I had stored all this stuff inside and there was a delay in feeling the symptoms. I went on medication for six months or something and felt weird taking pills at the age of 25. I felt it was doing damage to me psychologically because I'd always thought of myself as healthy and unassailable. I started to get better, to the point where I took myself off the medicine without calling him. Quickly after that I had some symptoms. The doctor told me to take the medication for a few months, which I did, then went off it again.

PLAYBOY: Do you still get the attacks?

DAMON: I get symptoms, but they don't start snowballing now. I really love my job, and I don't feel the perspective with which I do it now would lend itself to having an anxiety attack.
A quote from the Cosmopolitan article led to this piece from MSNBC here:

Damon wants to butt out

Matt Damon is resorting to hypnotism to help him give up his smoking. The "Bourne Supremacy" star has had a two-pack a day habit for over 10 years and is so desperate to stop that he has been visiting a hypnotist to cure him, says a source.

"He's tried a couple of things before, but nothing has worked," says the insider. "We're hopeful this time."

"It's working," Damon's rep happily told The Scoop. "His first treatment was in August and he hasn't smoked since then."
But that story above seems to be contradicted by a new article in the German TV Movie magazine, depending on the timing of the interview. The German article is summarised here, and an English version appeared at ananova, below:

Private Matt shuns public eye

Matt Damon says he's scared he'll never find love in the public eye.

"I think that too many relationships have been destroyed by the press," he told TV Movie magazine. "I prefer to keep my private life out of the public eye."

But the actor says he also has a second reason for avoiding too much attention.

"I don't want people to find out too much about my bad habits," he said.

And he admits his main reason is not wanting to be photographed while smoking.

"Cigarettes are a bad thing," he said. "I've tried to give up a couple of times but had no success. It's very frustrating."
Denzel Washington seems to have a new grudge against Matt according to his quotes in this World Movie Mag interview for Man on Fire:

Q: There are three more books with your character Creasy in. Any plans for a prequel?
I didn't even know that to be honest with you. But thank you. I must say I saw the Bourne Supremacy the other day and it pissed me off. I was like 'Man he's got a good franchise going on'.
There's a few mentions of the just-turned 34 year old Matt in this George Clooney Daily Record interview, but don't trust the source too much.
Details of The Bourne Supremacy DVD are at this press release, but what happened to the Paul Greengrass commentary?

10/04/2004

Matt's interviewed in the November issue of Cosmopolitan magazine as the reverse cover. Many thanks to the Big Matt Fan for all scans, which are on a separate page here. Selected quotes:

Is there anything you wouldn't do for a role?
I wouldn't smoke for a role. Not now. I smoked two packs a day for 15 years, and I just quit a couple of days ago. I've quite a couple of times before, but the way I'm quitting now...it's really great. I'm going to a hypnotist.

Do you and Ben get to hang around as much as you used to?
I've been away a lot, and he's been working hard too. It's a deep and abiding friendship, but we've seen each other less frequently since we become famous than at any other point in our lives. We talk about each other and our friendship [to the press] more than we see each other, but he knows how I feel, and I know how he feels.

Have you ever been dumped?
Oh yeah. I got dumped really badly at my high school prom. We went to an after-party on Cape Cod, which is two hours from Boston, and my girfriend bumped into an ex-boyfriend at the party. We all went back to a little shack, and her sister told me to sleep in this lounge chair. My girlfriend and the guy jumped into the bed next to the chair, and for the whole night, I was at the foot of the bed while they were hooking up. I didn't have a car... I was stuck there. It was horrible.

When in your life have you been most happy?
Right now. I'm happy now.
Thanks also to the Big Matt Fan for this quote from actor Sean Astin's new biography There and back again (paraphrased):

There is a mention of Matt on page 55. Apparently, Sean auditioned for Matt's role in Courage Under Fire. However, he does say that while he could have "taken a stab at it," "Matt nailed it" and he talks about the nuance Matt brought to the role. He also says that when he heard about the weight Matt lost, he was initially concerned after everything he (Sean) had gone through, but Matt seemed to handle it well. He says Matt has his "respect and admiration."
Ben made the following comments about Matt during his stint on Saturday Night Live - story by contactmusic.

Affleck takes on Damon after snobby blockbusters comments

BEN AFFLECK poked fun at MATT DAMON on American TV on Saturday night (02OCT04), claiming his friend's comments about stars who only take roles in potential blockbusters were aimed at him. Hosting the season debut of satirical show SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, Affleck launched an into-camera attack on his pal for comments he allegedly made about actors who only take on the big roles. He joked, "Listen bro', we all know who you're talking about. It's been kind of a mainstream year for me; OK, stop rubbing it in. I get halfway through PAYCHECK, I went to ask the theatre manager for my money back and I remembered I was in it.

"I know you're not into stardom but help me out here. I can't seem to recall which CHEKHOV play THE BOURNE SUPREMACY is based on. I'm sure they'll be studying OCEAN'S TWELVE in the film classes at USC (University of Southern California), believe me, because OCEAN'S ELEVEN left so many unanswered questions."

Affleck also poked fun at his ex-fiancee JENNIFER LOPEZ, adding, "You wait 'til you lose your mind and make two movies in a row with your girlfriend."

He concluded his joke rant by poking fun at his pal's friendship with GEORGE CLOONEY: "By the way, street cred, how's Clooney's yacht treating you? Is there a phone on that thing? I've been trying to call you for three weeks."
Finally, author Peter Biskind talked about Harvey Weinstein and Matt during a BFI interview.

Biskind: Somebody like Matt Damon, who wrote the script and came up with Good Will Hunting [Gus Van Sant, 1997], that film made something like $114 million, and Matt Damon was paid $300,000 to write and act in the movie. Harvey gave him a $500,000 bonus, but in terms of how much the movie made and how much Miramax made off that movie, he should have given a $5 million bonus, and Matt Damon actually went on strike and refused to appear in Dogma [Kevin Smith, 1999] until Harvey forked over a $1 million cheque to both Matt Damon and Ben Affleck - each... anyway...

Moderator: But it's also interesting... that's the unusual story, because Damon had the power to...

Biskind: ...to extract the money, but they had to fight for it.

10/02/2004

Matt and George Clooney are now filming Syriana in Geneva. There have also been re-shoots for Ocean's Twelve in Las Vegas and Amsterdam this week, and an Italian article reports that Matt was seen in Rome on Wednesday night having dinner with the president of Italian soccer club Lazio after a day of shooting for O12 (if my translation is correct).
In a new Entertainment Weekly online story photographer Gavin Bond talks about his recent EW cover shoot of Matt, and the photo at right.

Photograph by Gavin Bond, June 22, 2004, Rome

After a day of shooting ''Matt being Matt,'' Bond says he and the Bourne Supremacy star ''wanted to do something extra that was more in the vein of the movie...something that was a bit more gritty and more like his character.'' So with the sun fading fast over the Italian landscape, the duo ducked into an unfinished warehouse where Bond switched to black-and-white film. The result? A hauntingly evocative still of the pensive actor. Laughs Bond about the spontaneous shot, ''It wasn't really thought over.''
Robert Patrick talks a little about the filming of All The Pretty Horses and how much he enjoyed working with Matt in a story at chud.com.
From the National Enquirer, thanks to the Big Matt Fan:

Catwoman HALLE BERRY thinks MATT DAMON is as irresistible as catnip--but he's not biting. "Halle has been making it extremely clear through their managers that she's definitely interested," says a pal of the beautiful Oscar winner: But Matt keeps clear of high-profile babes. "For Matt, dating someone like Halle would be a nightmare," says the insider.
From an interview at TV Guide Online with comic Michael Ian Black:

TV Guide Online: Have you ever done any interviewing or guest-hosting stuff?
Michael Ian Black: I did. When Stuck on You came out, I interviewed Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, Cher and the Farrelly brothers for a special on Comedy Central. And I learned that, in person, Matt Damon is actually gorgeous. Incidentally, so is Cher.

10/01/2004

Matt is likely filming Syriana in Morocco, so there is no news around at present.
The new Australian version of OK magazine has a one-page story by Australian journalist Andrew Denton about Matt's recent visit on his show Enough Rope. A number of questions and answers that didn't air are provided as text, and Andrew writes the following as his introduction:

All-round nice guy Matt Damon

I met Matt for the first time moments before the interview. I shook his hand, gave him my famous smile and he gave me his far more famous smile back. He was very charming and unfailingly polite to everyone. He didn't strike me as having much bullshit about him.

Our homework told us this was a really smart guy, and he didn't flinch at my questions I put to him about Hollywood making some awful films. Afterwards, he was worried he'd been too serious but I found him great fun. Before we went on, I joked, 'Look, I know you're busy so just give us one foetal position, one outburst of anger, the full Oprah and you can go.' So that's what he did.

The best compliment I can give Matt is, when I asked him 'Are you a good actor?' he took about ten seconds to answer. I really liked that he had the good grace to sit there and not be quite sure of the answer.

In sum, I hated him. He was handsome, he was charming, he was intelligent. The kind of man I could do without a lot more often!
Thanks to Jeri Jo for these mentions of Matt from Soap Opera Weekly magazine.

They have a section called "Recommended List" and two soap stars on two different shows mentioned our guy under the heading of "Flick Pick".

Michael Park (Jack, AS THE WORLD TURNS) suggests screening:
"Since I'm now playing this amnesiac, I saw "The Bourne Supremacy" and I absolutely adored it. If you haven't seen it, I can only tell you two things: You feel like you're in the flat, and you feel like you're in the car. That's all I can say. I like Matt Damon; I think he's a very smart actor. His choices in the movie were very simple. They told a story and I didn't see him acting. It was just dead-on. The simplicity worked very well."

And Ashley Bashioum (Mackenzie, YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS) agrees:
"The Bourne Supremacy" was really good. There was so much action, but I think Matt Damon's role in "Stuck On You". That was such a funny movie. It was so underrated. He was so awkward. It was great. I give him two thumbs up for that film. It was hilarious. I thought he definitely did a good job."