Ben Affleck’s standalone Batman movie has been confirmed by Warner Brothers. He’s going to direct and star, and will also make a cameo as Batman in this summer’s Suicide Squad. (More details and potential spoilers here.) So he should be on top of the world, but he seems to have taken the bad reviews hard, his personal life is a mess and he looks disheveled and out of it in recent paparazzi photos. (He doesn’t look that bad here, but The Daily Mail has photos of him out in sweatpants looking like he just rolled out of bed.) There may be a reason for that. Star reports that Affleck, who just moved down the street from his family’s house to Brooke Shields’ rental mansion yet again, spent a week at friends’ homes prior to his move. If Star is to be believed, he overstayed his welcome too.
He’s personally worth an estimated $75 million, with a movie currently in theaters that’s grossed over $700 million… so you’d think Ben Affleck wouldn’t mind coughing up for a nice hotel room while in between homes. But a pal says he spent a week couch surfing at friends’ houses before moving into his new digs across the street from the house he shared with Jennifer Garner and their three children.
“He said he wanted to be with his friends because hotels don’t afford the same privacy,” says a tipster, who adds that Ben “is acting like a single guy with lots of time on his hands, emptying their fridges and not offering to pay for a thing.”
While his pals have been happy to put him up, it isn’t exactly like the good old days.
“Most of them have kids now too. They didn’t really need a slobby bachelor coming and going unannounced and staying up all night.”
[From Star Magazine, print edition, thanks Kaiser!]
Considering how rich Ben Affleck’s friends are he’s probably staying in guest houses with their own kitchens, not sleeping on couches and raiding the main fridge. This gives me an excuse to look up Matt Damon’s mansion which is right down the street from the Garner-Afflecks. It’s incredible of course and it looks like there’s a guest house right next to the pool, although I can’t confirm that from the listing. Star Magazine reported just last fall that Affleck has been staying in Damon’s guest house, but maybe this time he’s hitting up other friends. You know that Damon doesn’t care, but his wife might. Affleck might just want to be around friends too, it looks like he’s having a rough time lately.
photos credit: FameFlynet and WENN
Meh. He had the world on a platter and threw it away. No sympathy here.
You’re assuming a lot. You don’t know what it’s like being married to her, or what she’s like in private. Maybe she made life hell for him. If she is such an amazing wife, why isn’t she still married to Ex-Husband #1?
Oh please, let’s not make him a victim here. He has a long history of substance abuse, gambling and womanizing. He might have demons to fight but it’s not Garner’s fault, if anything she helped him become the big shot, Hollywood A-lister that he is now by boosting his image. Does anyone remember the state his career was before he married her?
Whatever their relationship, she is clearly a stabilizing influence for him. He is clearly falling apart without that even though people here predicted that he would blossom once he got out. I also think thats why he is still hanging on close to a year after he got his “freedom” back.
@Anthi – lol @the idea that post-Gigli, post-Jersey Girl Ben had to condescend to marry Alias/13 Going on 30-era Garner.
Before The Town, she and their first kid were the main thing anyone found likable about Ben.
She could be the nastiest human on earth…doesn’t give him the right to boink the nanny. If you’re so miserable, leave. They have the means to separate without financially taking a hit or ending up on the street.
There are some simple and naive opinions here about relationships. People cheat for a variety of reasons but ultimately it is symptomatic of a very flawed and failed relationship. Ben apparently cheated on every famous girlfriend that we know he had, and Garner herself cheated on a husband and a boyfriend. This whole Saint Garner and Good-For-Nothing Ben routine is tired and inaccurate. Neither is that great, regardless of how much Suzy Homemaker stories Garner puts out there. If I had to guess– and it’s all a guess unless someone knows them personally– he wanted out of the relationship long ago but didn’t want to be the one to end it. So he sabotaged it. She just put up with it and played the dutiful doormat longer than most. How that makes her this amazing person to some of you is beyond me. If he were truly this terrible husband, she should have kicked him to the curb long ago, not waited until he publicly humiliated her first. I think if the nanny thing hadn’t got so much press she would have let that slide, too. I really just can’t respect a person who lets their spouse walk all over them like that. P.S. His obvious talent as a filmmaker would have happened with or without her. She didn’t “make” him. All she did was attach her (fake) pr-generated image to him for a family-friendly version of him — which was never, ever accurate. The man likes to drink, gamble and fool around. And apparently her eyes were “wide open” to that. (Yeah right).
@Marisa — Agree with you on almost all fronts. Been saying this for a long time. I don’t hate Jen at all, but people’s need to canonize her is way over the top. And yes, she certainly supported him in the way spouses should in any marriage, but his work stands on its own.
“If he were truly this terrible husband, she should have kicked him to the curb long ago, not waited until he publicly humiliated her first… I really just can’t respect a person who lets their spouse walk all over them like that.”
No offence but this is the most “naive and simple minded” assessment of a relationship I have read in a very long time.
@Naya Uh, so a woman should just put up with a husband who regularly cheats on her, gambles and boozes it up instead of being at home, etc? Yeah, that is very caveman mentality. Join us in 2016 please.
Agree Garner isn’t a saint either, she cheated on her first husband Scott Foley and Vartan and she knew what kind of guy she was getting in Ben. The only reason Ben married her is because she got pregnant. NOT a great foundation to start a marriage. I think Ben felt trapped, he has demons, she enabled him, had more kids with him and they both contributed to their problems and demise of the marriage. Now they just need to finalize the damn divorce, enough already!
@anya Hilarious. This shouldn’t need explaining but I’ll do it anyway. My point was obviously that human relationships are complex. People stay in damaged relationships usually because they are damaged people. I can bet you, many here have been in an unhealthy relationship that took time to register or leave. So while we urge people to make healthier choices, we dont write the judgemental post you left under a different handle above. Its called human compassion.
this just doesn’t add up: one week, more than one house. So, his millionaire friends couldn’t afford feeding him for 3 days? This is really an idiotic story.
Well at least they didn’t go as far as saying he’s been staying at Matt’s house and Matt’s wife is pissed.
VERY idiotic story.
Rough time? Look at the pictures from the Daily Mail today – out with his kids yesterday on Jen’s birthday. He looks thin, cleaned up and happy (well, as happy as he ever looks when being photographed.) Wonder why he’s sticking around LA when JL already started filming in London on 4/11.
And how dare an actor dress down in sweatpants and a T-Shirt on his downtime in LA. Doesn’t he know he must always be pap ready. Shame on you Ben.
Yeah, no to this story. He looked nervous before the movie came out. Ever since his Batman received great reviews by critics and fans- despite their feelings about the Director’s work- he has seemed the happiest he has been in a while. It’s like a weight lifted from his shoulders.
He’s never going to be too happy around the paparazzi.
SS Spaceballs, spot on.
They always do that to Jon Hamm, too. “Dapper Draper barely recognizable in ball cap and basketball shorts!” I mean, only if you’re an idiot.
He does look happy. The way that some people actively root for him to spiral downward is just pathetic and says more about their character than it does anything else. It takes two people to make a relationship work, and two to make it fail. That’s just reality. People want to place all of the blame on him but that is simply illogical.
He looks better and normal to me.
Hey Ben it’s ok. Whenever you’re in NY you can stay at my crib and raid my fridge just as much as you like for as long as you like.
Looking forward to your Batman solo movie.
I think he looks good is these photos–the best I’ve seen him look in a while.
I so much prefer him with a beard and I dig the salt and pepper thing he’s got going on.
Yeah, his face is back to normal. I like him with facial hair and a some grey in it also.
I was looking forward to the movie he was directing and acting in. But Ben with that doughboy face is going to be hard to take. What was he thinking?
That’s what straight out made me want to bang him in BvS. The way he looked with the beard and salt and pepper hair was hot. Hell, I want to bang him now.
I thought I was crazy for thinking he looks so attractive this way… hahahaha
He looks good and settled now. I hope they get their private life situation worked out and over.
His friends wives are probably worried if his presence will cost them a good nanny.
I read a VERY interesting and snarky opinion on the nanny situation:
“Not a blind, exactly, but Lainey keeps referencing Gone Girl and calling Jennifer G Amazing Amy and indicating that Ben is an idiot who got played. She’s also mentioned that everyone was questioning the idea of Jen hiring a hot nanny. Is anyone else reading this to be that JEN WAS DONE AND WANTED OUT so therefore hired the hot nanny, knowing what he’d do and knowing she could use it to look extra good in the divorce?”
Ha! It made me chuckle.
Jen wanted out? LOL That’s funny. He might have been too weak to outright ask for the divorce because she wasn’t giving up on it, so by his passive-aggressive behavior, she eventually was forced to acknowledge the marriage was over.
I think she means Amazing Amy as in manipulative and always selling an image that is nothing like the truth and he is the one who comes off looking bad. She used to be scathing about Garner but changed. I don’t know when because I didn’t read her regularly for awhile.
He still has that suite or bungalow at the Beverly HIlls Hotel, I imagine. All he has to do is order food at the hotel or order takeout delivered to his rental house. I doubt he’s staying at friends to mooch their food.
A lot of male and female celebs look kind of disheveled as far as hair looking like it’s not combed and sloppy clothes on certain days. Big deal. Although, he looks fine to me in the photos and his clothes look fine.
OHMYGODSTOPMAKINGBATMANMOVIES.
Seriously. There are about thirty of them now.
and spider man and marvel movies…sick of all of them.
He’s always dressed like a schlub, the only time he cleans up is when he’s promoting something. People don’t know this by now? Him resorting to friends’ houses is just more evidence that he needs to buy his own place already. This charade of an amicable split isn’t doing anyone any favors. He clearly just wants out.
Aaaaw, Superpuppy.🤗🤗
Who knows if the Star story is true, but it’s not saying Ben is still staying with friends – just that he stayed with friends for a week before he moved into Brooke’s rental place, where he supposedly is now. That’s not so far-fetched. Maybe he had to wait to move into Brooke’s place.
All these stories about poor Ben and how he’s going downhill without Jennifer are ridiculous. Ben has *always* had this schlubby look – before, during and after Jen – including the dour face when being papped. People want so badly to believe that he just won’t be happy without her. It’s just photo assumption.
He looked great and happy yesterday out with his kids on Jen’s bday (Remember her bday last year? He was at a gas station in rural Canada without his wedding ring.)
I am curious what’s going to happen when they’re all in London for a month in May. Wonder if he’s waiting around LA now so they can all go over together.
Lainey did a little piece on his roughness. I agree with it. I know people who live in that same cycle. http://www.laineygossip.com/On-Ben-Afflecks-conflict-of-shame-in-new-Buzzfeed-article-titled-The-Unbearable-Sadness-Of-Ben-Affleck/43471
When is he filing for divorce? I thought he could not wait to be out of that marriage. Jen has been in NYC a few times now working on it.
She’s been in NYC working on what?
Basically the press has no real clue about their living situation, never did. First they had him living in the guest house. Then he was in the main house in the room adjacent to Jen’s. Then he was in the rental house next door. Now he’s couch surfing. They’re just making it up as they go along…
I really wish he’d find a nice girlfriend and look happy. He has all the opportunity in the world to be happy, no reason for playing media games with the ex and looking miserable in the process. Move on.
Yeah, me too. But I have a feeling he might be caught in the cycle of trying to get back into Jen’s good graces, especially given the public beating he’s taken. I have no doubt they’ll be in the same negative place two years from now if they don’t divorce this time around. Looks Jen had a marching band shin dig for her bday. Doesn’t say whether Ben was there, but I have a feeling he was. Because of course.
A marching band what? How do you know this?
Last year, he was in Canada without his wedding band (although they may have been separated anyway) with another woman on her b-day. She filmed with Ina Garten and her whole demeanor seemed forced.
According to People mag, he wasn’t there. He took the kids to dinner.
Yeah, you’re right, @Lila – it appears he wasn’t there, at least not for all of it. He took the kids to dinner during the party. If this is the case, then I’m glad they’re finally starting to disentangle themselves from one another. Seems about time.
I think he actually may have been there. There are two men with Ben in the photos with the kids at dinner. They’ve been in lots of candids with Jennifer over the years and I think they might be family. So my guess is the men took the kids out for dinner while the party was being set up. No way the kids were out until 11pm (when People says the party ended).
None of the articles said Ben was out for dinner with anyone other than the kids, although it looked like they were talking to people outside the ice cream shop. Ben could have taken the kids home with him (wherever it is that he lives :)) and put them to bed / kept them until the party was over. Even if he still lives at the house, that should have been easy enough considering how big it is, and there is a guest house. The People article made it seem like Ben took the kids out on purpose while Jen had her party, but who knows with these two. I think she is being pretty cagey publicly about whether they’re staying together – if that’s what they’re doing.
The full set of candids are on Ben’s Brazilian fan website and they were definitely with the two men. Seraphina was sitting on the older man’s lap. The same guy has been in lots of candids with Jennifer over the years.
How you get them is how you lose them. Garner cheated on her S/O with Ben, karma is a beeyotch and all of that…
It doesn’t make sense that he’s moved back into Brooke Shields’ place. It’s just been put back on the rental market in the past couple of weeks. I think Ben rented it when things were really bad after the initial split but according to People and Vanity Fair he’s still living in the family home.
What’s going on with his eyebrows?
Finally someone ask the real question ! Bleach? For a role ?
Deus … I wish people would stop treating Lainey like she’s the Oracle of Delphi.
He looks old!
Look at the x17 pics today with the headline that Ben and Jen are basically back together. Who knows, but they look pretty cozy. I’m telling you … London trip … the reconciliation is coming.