“Watching people come out crying”: Matt Damon and Ben Affleck Went Through Torture For Months After Getting Rejected From Robin Williams’ Oscar Winning Movie

Emerging through his pivotal performances in cinema, Matt Damon has proven his versatility as an actor. His extensive repertoire encompasses projects like the Jason Bourne franchise, The Martian, and The Departed. With skills spanning drama and action genres, Damon stands as a notable Hollywood icon.

Matt Damon

The turning point in Matt Damon’s career arrived alongside Robin Williams in the 1997 film Good Will Hunting. However, prior to this success, Damon experienced a near-miss opportunity to collaborate with the late actor years earlier.

Matt Damon And Ben Affleck Lost Key Roles

During an EW SiriusXM Town Hall conversation, Matt Damon delved into insights gained during his formative career phase, sharing experiences of vying for roles that slipped through his grasp. In response to a query about a particularly poignant near miss, he disclosed, “Well, Dead Poets Society. Ben and I got called back on that.“

Matt Damon and Ben Affleck

The duo of Damon and Ben Affleck faced more than just a missed opportunity for their inaugural breakthrough in the realm of the Academy Award-nominated movie. Despite eventually securing their joint Best Original Screenplay Oscar triumph for Good Will Hunting, the twinge of losing out on that chance became even more poignant for the inseparable friends and subsequent creative partners.

“When it came out, Ben and I worked at a movie theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the one movie they played all summer was Dead Poets Society,” said Damon. “And we had to sit there in our black pants, white shirt, maroon vest, black bow tie, sit there, tearing tickets, serving popcorn, and then watch people crying their eyes out as they came out. And we’re like, ‘That could have been us.’”

Matt Damon And Ben Affleck’s First Major Roles

In the lead-up to the 1989 film’s release, Damon had already marked his cinematic debut with a single-line appearance in the Julia Roberts-starrer Mystic Pizza. The turning point arrived in 1992 when Damon and Affleck secured their inaugural significant roles in another school-centered movie, School Ties.

Matt Damon and Ben Affleck

According to the actor renowned for his portrayal of Jason Bourne, these instances of disappointment appear to have wielded a significant influence on their respective journeys in the industry. He said,

“There are the experiences that they either crush you or they inure you to the realities of this business, and for us, it made us more determined.“

Yet, in a surprising turn, the actor disclosed during his acceptance speech in 2016 that he and his fellow co-star found their motivation to take on the project from none other than the iconic Sylvester Stallone. He asserted that Stallone’s creation of the Rocky film, where he not only penned the script but also featured as the lead, served as their inspiration. They both fervently pushed for studios to give them the chance to enter the cinematic stage as a result of this.