Key Points
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Ben Affleck reflected on one of the last conversations he had with his mom before her death.
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Chris Affleck died at age 83 in June.
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Ben and brother Casey Affleck also lost their dad, Tim Affleck, earlier this year.
Ben Affleck is, admittedly, dealing with “a lot” following the death of his parents, Chris and Tim Affleck.
The Animals star spoke candidly about his “big year,” during an interview with GQon Tuesday, explaining how losing both of his parents in a two-month span has allowed him to think about his “own mortality.” One thing Ben reflected on is something his mom said before she died.
“My parents were lucky, right? They lived long lives. Longer than the one’s expectation is, whatever. That’s kind of what you get,” he said. “I remember my mom said to me at one point, ‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘I had a great life, and I have no regrets.'”
He continued, “She said, ‘But I thought 83 years would feel like longer.’ I thought, ‘S—, I get it. I bet.'”
Ben and Casey Affleck’s hometown newspaper The Boston Globe announced that Chris died at 83 on June 2 from cardiopulmonary arrest. The newspaper revealed that she had been given “six months to live” in December 2025. A few months later, Casey confirmed during a Venice Film Festival press conference that the brothers had also lost their father this year.
“It brings up all these — I mean, your childhood, how you were raised, you see things differently, you appreciate your parents in different ways,” Ben said during Tuesday’s interview. “You realize, yeah, we only get so much time.”
Ben remembered his mom as a “pretty extraordinary and brave” woman. He added, “Her death really did cause me to even more deeply and fully appreciate her and her life.” After her death, Ben and his family — including kids Violet, 20, Seraphina, 17, and Samuel, 14 — took a “really great” trip.
On the other end, Ben admitted to having a “complicated relationship and not a very close one” with his father near the end of Tim’s life “for lots of reasons that I just don’t want to talk about, frankly, to people.” Their ups and downs taught Ben an important lesson: “If you don’t deal with it, you don’t fix [it], like, it’s just not going to happen.”
The Good Will Huntingactor said that both of his parents’ deaths were “horrible but not tragic,” which was “an interesting thing” for him to experience.
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“This is normal,” he explained of losing his parents. “I certainly don’t want to outlive my children. That would be the worst thing I can imagine. So, this is the way it’s supposed to go, but it’s still really sad for me.”
Watch Ben’s full GQ interview above.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly
