Ben Affleck underwent a physical transformation before starring in the movie ‘Armageddon’, released in 1998. The American actor revealed that he had to undergo certain aesthetic touch-ups to embody the role of the leader of asteroid drillers that he played in fiction.
In a conversation with his friend and colleague Matt Damon for an interview with the media Entertainment Weekly, the interpreter told how he faced the preparation of the character and shared some information about the production of the film.
“They excavated two Disney sets to recreate huge asteroid craters and I didn’t even think about the fact that the basic premise of the movie was totally absurd”, he reflected on the plot.
And added: “Why train drillers to be astronauts instead of training astronauts to be oil drillers? One would think that the learning curve would be a little steeper in the journey from an oil driller to that of an astronaut… But it was fun and it came at the right time.”
The actor revealed Here are the expectations the team had for his role in the big-budget film. “I was a bit naive about people’s opinions of me and Michael’s (Bay, director) and Jerry’s (Bruckheimer, producer) comment on my appearance was: ‘You have to go to the sunbed!’”, said the partner of Jennifer López.
And continued: “ They made me fix my teeth, exercise and look sexy. ‘Be sexy’, they told me. How do I do it? ‘Going to the gym!’ Running in the gym and putting oil on my body and stuff turned out to be a version of one of those topless male calendar models in a garage carrying tires all greased up. Michael had a vision of a male torso glistening in oil and said, ‘That will go in the trailer and sell tickets!’ And, really, what can you say in those moments?”, he said.
Watch the video at the minute 18: 50
Despite his decades-long career, Affleck said that ‘Armageddon’ is the film of his entire filmography that his children like the most, all born from his relationship with his ex-wife Jennifer Garner: Violet, aged 16, Seraphina, aged 13 and Samuel, 9. “It’s funny, because that’s the only movie of mine that my kids have seen and they admit that they love it. I liked it, even though they mock me relentlessly,” said the Oscar winner. “They often comment: ‘Are you driving a tank on the moon?’ But they have fun, you know what I mean? They won’t even see ‘The Town’, so there you have it”.
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