When it comes to famous Hollywood exes, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner are arguably amongst the most notable. The two were married for over a decade and, while they’ve been divorced for some time now, they still remain quite friendly. As far as their personal lives go, the pair have praised each other as co-parents. And, work-wise, the pair are still so tight that Affleck was set on casting Garner in his new movie, and she accepted the role. However, Garner later dropped out of the film and that resulted from a concern.
Affleck’s latest directorial effort is the 2026 movie schedule entry Animals, a political crime thriller that sees him also starring as a mayoral candidate whose son is kidnapped. With that, the politician and his wife must come up with the ransom somehow after spending most of their funds on his campaign. The Oscar winner recently spoke to EW about casting the film, which was initially set to be led by Matt Damon. Affleck then recalled thinking that Garner would be perfect for the wife role:
I thought, God, Jen Garner would be amazing for this role. It also has the added benefit of, like, both of us will see our kids more because we do a week and a week and back and forth. I thought, well, we can coordinate our schedules around it.
Eventually, Garner did indeed sign on but, as time went on, some production changes came into play, as Affleck, Damon and co. decided to scrap the project. This was, in great part, due to the release of Spike Lee’s Highest 2 Lowest, as that movie has a very similar kidnapping premise. Affleck later revived the production though, by that time, Damon was unavailable due to filming The Odyssey. With that, Affleck decided to take on the role, but that gave Garner pause, as she brought up a good point:
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I talked to Jen, and she was like, ‘We don’t wanna do that. You just get baggage.’ I would love to work with her, frankly. She’s fabulous, and we’re really good friends, and I’m profoundly grateful to her, and we have a great thing. I still would wanna work with her in the future, but what you don’t wanna do is take the audience’s baggage and have it work against you, you know?
That “baggage” that the beloved 13 Going on 30 star seemingly refers to is the collection of preconceived notions that audiences have about her and Affleck’s relationship. Considering that many obviously know about Garner and Affleck’s past marriage (during which they were swarmed by paparazzi), it may be distracting to see them play a couple on screen. While I would’ve loved to have seen her and Affleck share the screen, I think that was ultimately the right call. And, thankfully, Affleck found another great actress to play his wife, Kerry Washington.
All of this speaks to the fact that film productions can go through a considerable amount of changes during the development process. When it comes to Ben Affleck’s latest movie, it sounds like he’s pleased with how everything eventually turned out. Still, I’m holding onto hope that he and Jennifer Garner will get to work together again at some point.
Check out Animals when it becomes available on October 9 for Netflix subscription holders, and it’ll also open in select theaters that same day.
