Welcome to the Matt Damon Column,
a forum for sharing news among Matt fans.

• Cathy wrote:
  I was wondering if you'd heard any news on whether Matt will be making an appearance at the Jay and Silent Bob premiere. I read that the premiere will be taking place on Wednesday, August 15 at 6:30pm at the Mann's Village Theater in Westwood. I'd love to catch a glimpse if there's a chance he's going to be there.
  (Thanks, Cathy, for the news about the premiere. If anyone out there have information about it, please do write me so I can pass the word on - thanks.)
• From Felicity:
  Some more late photos from the TCA event:
  photo 1
  photo 2
  Or with captions, go from the homepage at
  here.
  The first reviews of 'Planet of the Apes' are out, and they're not too positive, especially for Mark Wahlberg's character (bland, generic).

• From Kathryn:
  I happened to read Fametracker and came across a thread (entitled "Come Out, Come Out... Or Not", about celebrities whose sexuality is unclear; read it here where Matt is mentioned in relation to Ben. Bearing in mind, for the most part, this is conjecture, but one of the latest posts mentions a quote from Ben originally posted on the IMDb. The IMDb piece itself (from the 19th) goes something like this:
  Ben Affleck: 'Matt, Are You Straight?'
  Just like in his latest hit Pearl Harbor, Ben Affleck would beat up his best friend if he slept with his girlfriend in real life. In Michael Bay's WW II-drama, Ben and Josh Hartnett have a confrontation over Hartnett's relationship with Kate Beckinsale. "Like in the movie I would give my best friend a good slapping. But seriously, I really wouldn't know what to do. I'm glad to say that such an experience has never happened to me yet. It is tough when your best friend sleeps with your lady. My best friend Matt Damon wouldn't do such a thing. But the first thing I'd ask him if he did would be, 'Wow, Matt! Are you straight?'"
  A couple of the posts on Fametracker query the relevance of that quote to Matt's sexuality; I think it isn't anything but Ben's idea of a joke, and it's meant to be tongue-in-cheek. At least I read it like that - yet another reason why Ben continues to annoy me ;)

• From Felicity:
  Thanks to ebay I've just received a new magazine article with Matt. It's from the "Mail on Sunday", June 10 2001, and came out at the time of the "All the Pretty Horses" release in the UK.
  I'll copy out all of the stuff that's new and pass on the photo later. It's in Q&A format:
  Q: Is it true that your role in All the Pretty Horses nearly went to Ben Affleck?
  A: Believe it or not, yes. Ben really wanted to do this part because he'd read the book by Cormac McCarthy and it's one of his favourites. The problem was, he didn't look right. He and Billy Bob Thornton - who directed the movie - worked together on the film Armageddon, and were talking about casting, and Billy said to him, 'I wish you didn't look so old.' So there you have it. Ben's actually younger than me, but he looks older.
  Q: Did you enjoy working with Billy Bob?
  A: I wish I could do every movie with him. He directs the way Coppola and Gus Van Sant do - they stand right by the camera and they're close to the actors all the time, working with them.
  Q: Who was your first love?
  A: When I was a teenager, my mother took me to a language school in Mexico for the summer, and we lived with a Mexican family. The daughter and I had a tremendous crush on each other, even though we could hardly talk to each other, and never even so much as held hands. Young love.
  Q: Would you like to have children?
  A: I'm really looking forward to being a dad, but not yet. I'm very close to my brother's two sons, and I spend as much time with them as I can. On the other hand, spending any length of time around two little bambinos has made me realise that I don't think I'm going to have any of my own in the next couple of years.
  Q: Are you seeing anyone?
  A: Right now, I'm single. What? You're looking at me like you don't believe me, but it's true.
  Q: What things have you learnt about women?
  A: The most important thing I've learnt is that I am 30 and in no position at all to be giving any advice about them.
  Q: Who's the most impressive person you know?
  A: Probably my grandfather. He's Finnish, a very proud man, who would never take help from anybody. He came to America when he was a little boy, grew up during the Depression and sold shoes. He always used to tell us the story about getting a raise of three and a half cents, and how that was an incredible moment of success. He's extraordinary.
  Q: What has been your strongest motivating force?
  A: Being a younger brother. All the time I was growing up, there was this guy in the house (my older brother Kyle, who's now a sculptor) who was always bigger than me, faster than me, stronger than me, and I think there is some deep primal need in younger siblings that just doesn't go away, to compare themselves to the older one. When I was a kid, my dad used to say, 'It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game.' I used to say 'Yeah. Right, Dad. Whatever...'
  Stacey wrote:
  I didn't know his grandfather was Finnish, and I thought his mother's background was Swedish (he does have Swedish relatives in Minnesota).
• I think I'm finally starting to see the resemblance between Matt and Mark Wahlberg. Mark looks a lot like him in the previews for Planet of the Apes, so I understand why people compare them.
  (My note: Yes, there's a resemblance. And they are both from Boston. I think they are both about the same height also. Matt's features are more chiseled, but I know people who have a big crush on Marky Mark.).
• From Val:
  This is Marilyn (Beck)'s (E!ONLINE) take on Matt's current professional/private life:
  here and excerpted below:
  Dear Marilyn: Can you tell me what Matt Damon's working on? Who's he dating? Will he and Ben Affleck do another film together?
  Jeanine, Ann Harbor, Michigan
  Dear Jeanine: Damon, who just finished Ocean's Eleven, with Julia Roberts, George Clooney and Brad Pitt, is in Argentina making the low-budget film Jerry for Gus Van Sant. He also has The Bourne Identity slated for release next year, with Julia Stiles. He and Affleck got together for the upcoming Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and The Third Wheel.
  With such a breakneck schedule, you almost believe him when he says he's married to his career at this time and too busy for romance.

• From Valerie:
  • Same pic Felicity links to--worth seeing that great smile again, tho! Associated Press Photo
  • MR SHOWBIZ reports:
    Star Wars star Carrie Fisher is getting her own talk show on the Oxygen network, tentatively called Man Talk With Carrie Fisher. The actress joked that the show's real name will be "Men Who I Would Like to Sleep With if I Was Younger and Had a Better Body." Her first guest is her Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back co-star Ben Affleck.
    No doubt Matt's name will be jokingly dragged through the mud by Ben on this one. Keep an eye out for air time as none was mentioned.
• Mucho news from Felicity:
  • From the NY Daily News Monday:
    Affleck and Damon Get Real
    By DAVID BIANCULLI
    Daily News TV Critic
    Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, who won Oscars for writing "Good Will Hunting" (in which they also co-starred), are established Hollywood stars now. Yet with their new "Project Greenlight" documentary series, they're out to shake up the Hollywood establishment.
    Last September, the two, along with co-executive producer Chris Moore, announced a deal involving their LivePlanet company, Miramax Films and HBO.
    A Web site sought submissions from aspiring screenwriters, using the celebrity of Affleck and Damon to spread the word, with Internet users themselves voting for the finalists. More than 10,000 submissions later, Pete Jones, who wrote a script called "Stolen Summer," was the winner, giving him $1 million in production funds from Miramax and a guarantee the film would be made.
    Affleck, Damon and Moore, in turn, will deliver to HBO a behind-the-scenes reality series about the process, from the initial pitch to post-production. That 13-episode series, "Project Greenlight," will premiere on HBO in December.
    "Stolen Summer," starring Brian Dennehy, Bonnie Hunt and Aidan Quinn, will be distributed to theaters next spring.
    And while Damon and Affleck don't necessarily shy from the reality series tag ("'Survivor' is a great show," Affleck says, adding, "I would rather watch that 100 times instead of 'Veronica's Closet'"), Damon had other influential models in mind.
    "The documentary, we hoped, would be a lot more like 'Burden of Dreams' or 'Hearts of Darkness,'" Damon said, referring to making-of-the-film documentaries about, respectively, Werner Herzog's "Fotzcarraldo" and Francis Ford Coppola's "Apocalypse Now."
    "Between Chris, Ben and myself, we've done, you know, 30 or 40 movies," Damon said. "And there was always some kind of drama inherent to the process, just because people are under the gun and they're trying to make decisions fast and they're working really hard. With a $1 million movie - and we've all worked on $1 million movies - well, we just thought that was something that would make really fascinating television."
    Because the directors who were profiled in both "Burden of Dreams" and "Hearts of Darkness" basically had nervous breakdowns while making their movies, Damon was asked if the winner of the "Greenlight" competition was chosen with instability in mind.
    "I looked for insanity behind the eyes of all the 10 finalists," Damon joked, "and I found some in Pete."
    "If we were going to cast it and try to find someone who was going to go nuts," Affleck said, "there were other candidates who would have seemed more likely. Pete is a pretty stable guy. He's got a family, and he's an insurance man in Chicago."
    And how did Jones, who has finished principal photography and is about to tackle post-production, hold up? Sometimes, just fine. Other times, not so well.
    "There are trying times," he said, "when you're just thinking that being an insurance man in Chicago ain't so bad. I'd be thinking, it'd be nice to be working 9 to 5 and go home to my wife and baby and live somewhat of a normal life, instead of 7 [a.m.] to midnight, just to go back to your room and watch dailies, to figure out what mistakes you made two days ago.
  • There are some photos of a non-smiling Matt from the event now at ezuma: here.
  • Interesting note from a website (I may have passed it on before) - www.somanintheknow.com:
    SOMAN'S SHORTS
    I interviewed Matt Damon a couple of years ago when Good Will Hunting first came out. actually sat down with Matt, Ben and Minnie - all "nobodys" at that point - and was amazed at how innocent they were to the whole stardom thing. They talked about their loves lives freely, gossiped about other stars, actually told the truth. I remember Matt telling me that he never even questioned who would play the Will Hunting role simply because he wrote the short story that eventually became the movie - it was his show, he implied. But he told Premiere a month later that Ben proved he was his best friend by graciously deferring to him when they talked about who would play Will. They've all become huge stars since then, and as I anxiously await The Talented Mr. Ripley like everyone else, I wonder whether it's really possible for a star to be a star without selling out...
  • Another pic of Matt at the Rochester event with a band called gb leighton: here.
  • From the Las Vegas Sun Tuesday:
    Ben Affleck should just move into the Hard Rock Hotel. The actor, brunette again after a brief stint as a surfer-boy blond, was once again betting big at the hotel's blackjack tables early Sunday morning.
    Frequent partner in crime Matt Damon was also at Affleck's table, and so were three young ladies. Not that Affleck took the time to notice.
    The "Pearl Harbor" star rarely looked up from his cards, and when he did it was only to glare at the dealer after a bad hand.
    Affleck and Damon, although bona fide Hard Rock high-rollers, did not attend the hotel's VIP poolside PJ/lingerie bash earlier in the evening.
    Do you get the feeling that Matt wasn't even gambling?
  • From an interview with Denzel Washington:
    Washington seems to be taking the Oscar buzz for The Hurricane in stride (he's already be nominated for a Golden Globe) but if he does win, at least he has an idea, from Kline's offstage position, of how silly he looked the first time. It seems Washington, attending the Oscars two years ago as a presenter, was waiting in the wings when Matt Damon and Ben Affleck came offstage after winning their trophies for co-writing Good Will Hunting. "Matt got on the phone right away, squatting down with the audience 10 feet behind him," laughs Washington. "He said, 'I'm calling my girl.' Then he hugged me so hard he almost snapped my neck. I was like, 'Okay, okay.'"
    Must have been Winona he called...
  • I found an interview with Steven Pressfield, who's the author of 'Bagger Vance':
    PB: Who else did you see while you were on the set?
    SP: Another thing that struck me emotionally more than I expected it to was to see the actors in their period costumes--the plus-fours and sweaters, white oxford shirts with neckties and the old-time golf shoes. It's one thing to imagine it and another entirely to see it. Suddenly it really felt real. The guy who looked absolutely great in those duds was Matt Damon.
    PB: And how about Matt . . . did you two get a chance to talk?
    SP: The way the visit worked was I was escorted around by the Unit Publicist, Craig Bankey, who would kind of wave over the actors for a quick hello-how-do-you-do between takes. I had brought along signed copies of "Bagger" to give to Matt Damon and Will Smith. Will wasn't in the scenes that were being shot when we got there, so his copy must wait. But Matt Damon was, bundled up against the thirty-degree cold (when the day on the golf course was supposed to be summer). We shook hands, and he couldn't have been more down-to-earth or less impressed by his success, even though, if you ask any female between 12 and 21, the guy is bigger than Elvis. I admire the guy tremendously, not least as a writer, for Good Will Hunting, which won him and Ben Affleck the Oscar. A great script.
    As for golf, Matt said he had never played till being cast for the movie. They put him through kind of a crash course and now he's a fiend for the game. His dad was there on location, also a golf nut. As soon as the cameras stopped rolling, they were off having putting contests or heading for the range.
    PB: You visited the movie set in South Carolina last fall and met Robert Redford and the film's stars. What's Redford like in person and how did he treat you, the visiting author?
    SP: He couldn't have been nicer. He went out of his way to explain to me where he was coming from personally on the story, what appealed to him about it, and to tell me what changes he had made to the story and why. I was tremendously impressed with everybody, especially with their presence and star power and their dedication, particularly Robert Redford, to making the movie as good as they possibly could. They were into it. They were having fun.
    Cute.
• L. Holmes invites you to visit his very well done homepage, which now has a blurb on "Jerry".

• We've heard from a Matt fan from Boston! :-), who wrote:
  hi there. first I want to tell you that I really enjoy your site. As a fond follower of Matt, I think you do a great job of updating on Matts career and what he is up to. I live in MA right near Cambridge. As you noted on this site, Matt was here for about 2 weeks in the end of July into the first week of August. On Sunday the 29th of June, he was alone at a bar on Newbury St in Boston at 11pm. I read here about him golfing at the Andover Country Club with his dad. Well, last night I was out with some old and new friends...and somehow Matt Damon came up, and one of the girls shared that her husband was golfing there the day that Matt was there with his dad. Matt's dad introduced himself and his son "Matt" to the guys that were golfing and shared stories of the day on the course. My friends husband had no idea that it was Matt Damon (he is from Venezuela and not a big movie person.) Afterwords, his friends said, holy **** that was Matt Damon. Per his wife, Matt was a! nice, normal guy and had no pretentions about him. I think that is what makes Matt Damon so attractive, he does seem like the guy who sat next to you in Algebra class.
• And it's good to hear from Kathryn of Edinburgh also:
  Just wanted to mention something that I read in (June US edition) Cosmopolitan magazine whilst on the plane: there was a half-page segment on stars' worst dates. Matt was mentioned, and the only thing that made his story about being dumped on prom night stand out from any other standard quote was that he said that he caught his girlfriend "getting off" with another guy. "Getting off" is British slang, and of course I'm not sure if it would normally be part of his vocabulary, being an American. Matches up nicely with his liking for Newcastle Brown Ale, too (though I've never tried it, myself). :) Silly, but I thought it might be of interest.
  While I'm here I will also mention something I read in a copy of InStyle magazine. There is a section on furniture and ornaments, in which Matt is mentioned as having visited a store in NY to buy a vase of some kind (includes a picture of said vase). More of a tidbit than real news, I guess.

• From Felicity:
  • From another J&SBSB review at here:
    While Jay and Silent Bob are the focus of the film and the source of most of the humor, some of the funniest moments occur during the myriad of cameos Smith has managed to squeeze into this film. My favorite moment came in a scene with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon (swipe to read)on the set of GOOD WILL HUNTING 2: HUNTING SEASON. The two go back-and-forth criticizing each others choices in movie roles with dialogue so quick I'm afraid I laughed through half the jokes.
  • Don't worry about the article, but an 'interesting' drawing (see right) of Matt at here
  • A story of an extra on the set of Ocean's 11, includes a pic of Matt: here.
    Excerpt:
    Director Steven Soderbergh is attempting to make some kind of statement by not letting the extras wear blue, only the stars; apparently Matt Damon is a chain-smoker, but a very nice fellow and gifted actor--after talking about Boston with Rodney, he was willing to take a picture for Rodney's daughter at UNLV;
  • Matt's made an appearance with Ben promoting 'Project Greenlight'. And we get photos!!
    See here.(I believe it is also the photo featured above.)
    Caption: Ben Affleck, left and Matt Damon, executive producers of "Project Greenlight," chat before speaking to Television Critics Association members during HBO's part of the TCA summer press tour in Pasadena, Calif., Friday, July 13, 2001. Project Greenlight is a 13-episode documentary series chronicling the making of a feature film, "Stolen Summer," which will debut on HBO this December. Photo by Kevork Djanszian (AP)
    Cute photo #2: here.
    Caption:
    Matt Damon, right, executive producer of "Project Greenlight," laughs as he reponds to a question from a member of the Television Critics Association as fellow dais members, from left, executive producer Ben Affleck, executive producer Chris Moore, and writer/director of "Stolen Summer," Pete Jones look on during HBO's part of the TCA summer pess tour in Pasadena, Calif., Friday, July 13, 2001. Project Greenlight is a 13-episode documentary series chronicling the making of a feature film, "Stolen Summer," which will debut on HBO this December.
  • There are also some new pics of Matt at the event on here then do a search for Matt.
    How skinny is Matt looking, especially next to Ben? Tom Hanks and Britney Spears were also at the same event promoting new shows.
  • Anthony Minghella's in Australia this weekend for a conference, and there's an interview with him in 'The Sun-Herald". He's partly here meeting with crew members about Cold Mountain, and he talks a bit about the preparations:
    • it's going to be filmed "all round the state of North Carolina, in unendurable cracks and crevices, up mountains and down in pits".
    • "He's reportedly considering Cate Blanchett for one of the leads in Cold M ountain, a movie that already has Gwyneth Paltrow, Tom Cruise and Matt Damon after the top jobs."
    • He won't be drawn on his choice, but will only confirm that Australian actors do figure largely in his consideration. "Australia has two or three of the best actresses in the world at the moment. A lot of people are very, very interested in doing the film, but nothing's been announced yet because no-one yet knows."
• From a reader: found this pic (below left) on ebay, from an autograph collector.
  
• Diane sent in a couple of the photos from the Greenlight event mentioned by Felicity, from AP. Thanks! They are shown as today's feature photo and above right.

• I do like the idea of the Daredevil movie, especially with a good script, but the director is a real problem. And I love that line from Ulrich - a guy from Metallica calls Matt "a real sweetheart". They'll lose their tough image soon.
• Presumably true fan sighting of Matt from a website (cellblockv.com):
  My Date With Matt Damon
  Or rather, my aunt's date with Matt Damon.
  Or rather--I'm getting ahead of myself here.
  My Aunt Stephanie is 2 years younger than my mom & yet she still gets carded--regularly--for buying alcohol. She's petite, curvy figure blonde, with big blue eyes and a beautiful smile. I look at her and say "please almighty, let me look half as good as her when I'm 50." Anyway, she's always been a celebrity hound & has always managed to get mixed up with celebs in one way or another. A friend of hers is a caterer for the tv & movies that get shot here & needed a spare pair of hands (by the by--excellent cash there. $450 for two days of work) to serve breakfast & lunch for 250 extras, and the crew. So Steph, who is saving to buy a condo, says "sure, I can serve food & wipe down tables for that kind of scratch on a weekend. What's the movie by the way?"
  "Oh...Ocean's Eleven."
  Now, I personally think that it's a load of crap to remake Ocean's Eleven. C'mon, Dino & Frank did it right the first time--why do it over? But no matter, Steph goes down and starts slinging hash. She ends up some how being asked to bus tables in "that room" so she walks in and starts to see if anyone needs anything. George Clooney did, apparently. He not only gave her the eye, he gave her a full-blown up-an-down look. She said he's mega-handsome, but just not her type. No...she likes them a bit younger...and with Oscars.
  The next table over was Matt Damon, Steven Soderbergh and some other people. Stephanie marched right over, looked Matt dead in the eye, wet her lips and said "Can I get anything else for you?" Matt smiled that big smile and said "No thank you." Stephanie then took his plate & utensils (I say she should have kept them, but she didn't" and walked back to the kitchen where Clooney gives her the eye again. Steph's like "pfft, whatever" cause she's got her eye on Damon. So she dumps a tray, comes out, clears some more, and on her way back, Damon walks over & holds the door open for her "Allow me, please." he said.
  Up until now, Steph was cool as a cucumber. But when he offered to hold the door open for her, she just completely fell out. "I'm a really big fan of your work." She said just as she started to blush. "Oh, well thank you," he said--and then he put his hand on the small of her back as she walked into the kitchen with her dishes. He smiled, waved, and left. Later she found his "dailies" script and stole it, but I guess it has script notes in his handwriting even.
• A horrendous pic of Ben with newly blond hair (may be now in the recently archived columns): http://www.thesun.co.uk/bizarre/
  Another bit of trivia: former Mighty Mighty Bosstones player Nate Albert is another who went to the same school as Matt and Ben. He graduated with Matt in 1998.
• And it clicked... Remember that Matt said he put on a Texas accent for his Rainmaker audition because his girlfriend at the time was from there. She was Kara Sands, who has now settled in Texas. Symmetry...
• Liz Smith mentions the 'Cold Mountain' project today, and says Harvey Weinstein is looking at Tom Cruise (again). Could be some confirmed casting soon.

• A cute picture (see above) we've seen before:
  http://www.englishbaby.com/lessons/slang/slang88.htm.
• At the British Popcorn site there's talk of the Daredevil movie again, and Matt's name is listed as among the best picks for the lead. It is due to start shooting in November. See here.
• Great quote from a recent Lars Ulrich interview in Playboy:
  PLAYBOY: Your wife, Skylar, used to date Matt Damon, and he made her the model for the female lead in Good Will Hunting. A few years ago, Matt described you as "a f...ing rock star who's got $80 million and his own jet - a bad rock star, too."
  ULRICH: He said that before we met. And he's apologized about a hundred times. The first five times I saw him, he would spend 10 minutes apologizing profusely. He really is a sweetheart. Reply Reply All Forward Delete Previous Next Close

• Felicity's finds:
  • In a Corpus Christi article on the stars of Pearl Harbor, who filmed in the area:
    Kara Rose ran into Affleck at 21, the Mesquite Street martini bar that is partially owned by her husband Keith Rose, but it wasn't the first time they'd met. Kara Rose had lived with Affleck for more than two years as a result of her former relationship with, who else, actor Matt Damon. Kara Rose talked to Affleck for an hour that night, and she said that Affleck and Damon have undeserved reps in the media as being arrogant. "They are wonderful guys," she said. "People have written that Ben's cocky, but he's not."
  • She must be the ex formerly known as Kara Sands. A quote from Ms Sands: Matt, 27, broke up with his model girlfriend Kara Sands, for Rainmaker co-star Claire Danes, then 18. Sands reportedly said, "He should be babysitting her, not dating her."
  • A quote from Redford:
    "There are so many young actors who are already identified by the work they've done," says Redford. "Matt isn't like that. He makes each role his own and becomes the character he's playing. There's something very unspoiled about him."
  • For the information of those who haven't yet (or won't) be checking out the Dogma Special Edition DVD, the items to note re Matt are:
    • he features in a few of the deleted scenes and outtakes (mostly extended sequences from those seen in the final film)
    • From the commentary track with Kevin, Ben, Jason Lee, etc:
      • a discussion after the bus scene of whether it is the first time Matt has shot somebody on screen (talk of Geronimo, Courage Under Fire etc)
      • discussion in the boardroom scene of how Matt was very unsure of himself in the role of Loki, and sought constant reassurance from Ben as to whether he was funny
      • Quote from Kevin Smith: "Matt was really uncomfortable but he's a really funny guy", to which Ben replies "Incredibly funny"
      • Kevin also says Matt has got a great sense of humor and is really smart, and that he was really good in the film
      • From Ben: "He was scared and terrified (of the comic role) but really committed"
      • Kevin also comments on how everyone said Matt was brave for doing Ripley, but that's what he does (dramatic roles). By doing Dogma he was 'going away from his strengths', and therfore it was more of a challenge
      • In a discussion of Alan Rickman Kevin says that he's "not a very good judge of his own performance - Matty's the same way"
    • From the separate technical track
      • Miramax wanted Matt and Ben to fly to New York from Pittsburgh to the Sliding Doors premiere (Gwyneth was on the Dogma set). This greatly inconvenienced shooting, and everyone was upset that the two were being forced to attend. Matt didn't go to New York in protest.
      • Talk about Jason Lee being the original choice to play Loki, but that Miramax "leapt at the chance to cast Matty later on"
      • Kevin Smith talked about how there was a "weird climate on the set [while filming the bus scene the day after the Oscars] because they forgot to thank us. The weird atmosphere went after a day or so." Remember the mess about how Matt and Ben forgot to thank Kevin Smith in their speech...
      • Kevin knocked Miramax for not giving them enough money for Dogma, when Rounders got $12-14 million. Rounders is bleeped out, but he describes the film in question as as "people sitting around playing poker".
    • There may be more, but that's all I've seen so far. As always, with Ben being Kevin's pet he gets most of the attention, and is very vocal on the commentary track.

• Rutso (thanks!) provided the Czech translation for the text that accompanied the Bourne pic (posted yesterday):
  Prazska Jindrisska ulice v okoli hlavni posty se v polovine ledna promenila ve vanocni Curych.
  Prague's Henriette Street in the General Post Office neighborhood saw itself half changed into a mock Zurich.

  Tak trochu za to muze i herec Matt Damon, ktery zde pod vedenim rezisera Laimena Danga natacel snimek Jack Bourne Identity.
  So you might even have looked past actor Matt Damon, who here below leading director Doug Liman is shooting in a scene from Jack Bourne Identity.

  Dalsi exteriery stab natacel i na prazskem Pohorelci, kde byla k videni i nemecka herecka Franka Potenteova, znama diky filmu Lola bezi o zivot. Matta muzete v Praze potkat az do konce unora.
  Another exterior scene was shot at the Prague Pohorelci (?), where German actress Franka Potente has been sighted, familiar from the film "Lola Runs for her Life." You may run into them in Prague until the end of February.

• A photo of Matt (presumably on location) in Prague. No idea what the text is...
  Copied from this page.

  (Here's the text:
  Prazska Jindrisska ulice v okoli hlavni posty se v polovine ledna promenila ve vanocni Curych. Tak trochu za to muze i herec Matt Damon, ktery zde pod vedenim rezisera Laimena Danga natacel snimek Jack Bourne Identity.

  Dalsi exteriery stab natacel i na prazskem Pohorelci, kde byla k videni i nemecka herecka Franka Potenteova, znama diky filmu Lola bezi o zivot. Matta muzete v Praze potkat az do konce unora.")

  ---

• An old Ripley interview with Matt, which includes some new quotes. By a good interviewer, Prairie Miller: here
• From enteract.com, a report following the Democratic party event last year:
  Three's company It's hard to believe that Matt Damon could ever be a third wheel, but Damon served as a chaperone for lovebirds Salma Hayek and Ed Norton at an exclusive Hollywood after-party at the Standard Hotel. Damon, onscreen this fall in the Robert Redford film "The Legend of Bagger Vance," chain-smoked cigarettes in such rapid succession that we got a nicotine high just watching him. "All three of them were really friendly," our spy said of the power group. "Matt looked even better in person."
• A happy pic of Matt in Rochester (charity event a while back): http://www.aqmcm.com/
• A photo of Matt and Leo DiCaprio's mother (!) at the Berlin Film Festival, 2000 (warning: pdf file) here.
• From a German Redford interview:
  VSD : Paradoxically, the young stars in your movie Matt Damon, Will Smith, Charlize Theron, have built their career with these movies you're denouncing. RR : I felt the ditch that separates me from them. For example, there's one moment in the movie when Matt Damon says to Charlize Theron. � I loved the way we danced �. I had such a difficulty to make him pronounce these few words. He find himself ridiculous and said it was a sentence made for me, not for him. (Laughs) Finally, he managed to do it well, but he was right : Young actors today don't speak the same way that Paul Newman and I were speaking. Because, once more, the way movies are made has changed : the story, the dialogue are less important than before.

• From MattDamonLuvr7 aka �mAndi�:
  hey can you put that you got this info from MattDamonLuvr7 aka �mAndi�? mk neway this is kinda old stuff but ya know how matt damon has the voice of cale in titan a.e? well if u fastforward the movie to the end it has a behind the scenes look matt doesnt say a lot but you do get to see him a little even if he is wearing an ugly hat :( well neway great site!
• From Felicity:
  • From a Franka Potente interview in the Chicago Sun-Times today:
    Q. Any scandalous Matt Damon stories from starring with him in the upcoming ''The Bourne Identity.'' We won't tell anyone.
    A. We just wrapped it and Matt was a darling. We shot in Paris and in Prague, where it was so cold. One night we went to this cool nightclub where they served absinthe, which is an alcohol that's forbidden everywhere else. It's almost hallucinogenic because it's so strong. It tastes like nail polish remover. The night we drank it we ended up dancing on boxes and tables.
  • In People mag's story about Julia Roberts:
    "We had a dormitory life going there," Ocean's producer Jerry Weintraub explains of the high jinks that went on during the late winter shoot when Roberts, Clooney and their costars Matt Damon and Brad Pitt all stayed in adjoining villas at the Bellagio hotel. "We were in each other's rooms constantly, drinking, eating, partying and having a good time."
  • From a Claire Danes interview in Looks mag August 99:
    You're a very good friend of Winona Ryder. Were you responsible for introducing her to Matt Damon?
    Yeah, I actually was the first one to introduce them, and they met up again, but without me being there.
  • Various quotes. March 99:
    Question: How was it working with Matt Damon on Rainmaker?
    EA ClaireD: He's great. He's really enthusiastic about what he does, very dedicated to whatever film he works on. Really bright, very charming. Good man, good man. I'm a fan.
    From Seventeen mag about Claire Oct 98: "I know it seems strange, but we had a good time doing those hospital scenes in The Rainmaker -- even though it killed me that she had to look so awful. You really believed she was seriously hurt [she played an abused wife]. I kept wanting to bring her water or something and she would say, 'Matt, I'm really OK." -- Matt Damon, The Rainmaker costar
    This is the quote from Premiere:
    Apparently, she had desirability to spare, which overflowed into a short-lived off-camera romance with Damon. Now their lives are intertwined again. "Well, he's going out with my best friend," Danes says of Damon's liaison with her Little Women costar Winona Ryder. "It's cool. They're both wonderful people. So yeah, I'm very, uh, happy for him right now." She does a giant roll of the eyes. "It's weird."
    OK, I take my comment back about the two not being on civil terms. I remember from previous interviews that she refused to talk about him, and Matt never acknowledged their relationship publicly (think Movieline interview). They seem OK, but there's obviously some awkwardness there (or used to be).

• I finally got to read the People "Bachelor" issue, and learned that of the readers they surveyed, 2/3 preferred Ben over Matt. Now why did they have to ask that kind of question? It reminds me of my mom, who used to constantly make comparisons between me and my sister. Needless to say I wasn't thrilled about that, and it made us compete against each other for no reason at all.
  I am not surprised that Ben is more popular - the height, the big mouth, the overindulgence: these are things that the American public crave. I just hope that Matt doesn't take these things to heart.

• From Felicity:
  • Another truly random selection of stories. Many thanks to Rutso for the translations - great work! And Jerry is only one-third finished - when will it be completed??
  • Another Matt sighting in Boston. From a message board at backbaybeat.com:
    Matt Damon at "The Place" this weekend
    Him and a crew of fifteen called the place to reserve ther VIP room on friday night. He was pleasant and tipped the waitress very well.
    I think the venue is at Fanueil Hall, central Boston, and the date would have been 29 June, ruling out the Malibu story.
  • I found a note that Matt went to a surprise (competition winners only) Metallica concert in LA in July last year. Obviously interesting for the Skylar/Lars connection, and yes, Skylar may have been there.
  • Corey Feldman wrote apology letters to Matt and Ben after that infamous interview of a few years ago.
  • Remember Baywatch's Traci Bingham? She apparently went to school with Matt:
    PrtyAnml says: If you could have a love scene with any actor, who would you choose?
    Traci: Oh wow! (laughs). Let's see, hmmm....Well it definitely would not be Matt Damon, (no I'm just kidding). Matt is going to kill me. I went to school with him. He already thinks I'm spreading rumors about him but I'm not. I guess that's the only way to get a hold of him these days, since he's such a big star. (laughs)
    ET Host: And what school is that? All our aspiring actors out there might want to enroll!
    Traci: The Cambridge Randge and Latin in Cambridge Massachusetts near Harvard.I went there and so did Matt, and so did Ben Carr. But the name of the school is the pilot school.
  • Another quote from her: "There's more to life than running around in a red swimsuit on the beach," she says. "I have a lot of friends I went to [high school] with, like Matt Damon and Ben Affleck who are winning Oscars now. I enjoyed "Baywatch" - it was a great experience, but I want to be a film star.
  • From an interview with Selma Blair:
    threepoint2: What actors are you just *dying* to work with?
    Selma_Blair: Matt Damon, Nicholas Cage, and Jason Schwartzman.
  • From a Katie Holmes messageboard, posted May 25:
    I am from Montreal and recently there has been a lot of talk about a 'night out' that Katie had here a couple of weeks ago. It was around the time that Ben Affleck was still filming in Montreal as well. Katie, Ben, Matt Damon and Claire Danes were spotted attending a presentation of the movie "Enemy at the Gates" At the Paramount Movie theater in Montreal Downtown together. The four were seen inside having a great time and laughing together. After the movie, they got out by the back door to avoid creating a scene since Paramount theaters are very crowded at night. One of my friends served them. Katie ordered a big Coca Cola while Matt Damon grabbed a pop corn just before the movie started.
    Katie was filming 'Abandon' in the city, but Claire's not in the cast. Is she on civilised terms with Matt again??

• Kathryn wrote from Edinburgh:
  I just bought the new Empire magazine, and will let you know if there is any news concerning Matt in it. Thought I would let you know about Harry Knowles' review (of sorts) of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, in which he mentions Matt and Ben, albeit in one short sentence.
  I won't be going to see it myself as I don't think Kevin Smith is a particularly talented director; and I'm not sure I'd want to see the "remake" of GWH as is mentioned in Harry's review, however funny he claims it to be. Anyway, hope for more news soon.

• From Rutso:
  Here are the 3 texts and translations. No one seems to make the point that it's impossible to film the story in a snowy environment not because the cold may make it difficult for the actors to work, but because the story hinges on the two characters losing their senses because of dehydration.

  Damon estar� acompa�ado por Casey Affleck (el hermano de Ben) y, de acuerdo con publicaciones de chismes de Los Angeles, se tratar� de una pel�cula mediocre que, de no ser por la locaci�n, pasar�a desaparcibida totalmente para los argentinos. "Variety" asegur� incluso que se parecer� a anteriores pel�culas de Van Sant, como "Los marginados" o "Mi mundo privado".
  Damon will be joined by Casey Affleck (Ben's brother) and, according to Los Angeles gossip publications, will be involved with an ordinary film that, were it not for the location, would pass completely unnoticed by Argentinians. Variety even guarantees that it will look like Van Sant's earlier films like "To Die For" or "My Private Idaho".

  A chaque audition, tu es oblig� de mentir. Mon dernier mensonge en date: on m'a demand� lors d'un casting si je savais monter � cheval. J'avoue, c'est pas mon point fort. J'ai quand m�me r�pondu avec le sourire "je ne sais faire que �a, ma m�re est une jument."
  At each audition, you have to lie. My latest lie: I was asked during casting if I knew how to ride a horse. I admit it's not my strong point. Nevertheless I answered with a smile: It's all I know. My mother's a mare."

  Rodaje bajo cero Por culpa de una nevada en el Valle de Luna, se suspendi� el rodaje de Jerry, la pel�cula que Gus Van Sant filmaba en Argentina con Matt Damon y Casey Affleck. Seg�n cont� a Clar�n el productor argentino Enrique Bacher, de Altana Films, "se hizo la tercera parte, pero los actores no pod�an seguir filmando con fr�o".
  Filming below zero
  Due to a snowfall in Moon Valley, the filming of Jerry, the feature that Gus Van Sant is filming in Argentina with Matt Damon and Casey Affleck, has been suspended. As the Argentine producer Enrique Bacher of Altana Films told Clarin, "it's one-third made, but the actors could not continue filming in cold weather."

• Various news from Felicity:
  • From the Washington Post, in an article with Martin Short, about an interview in his new show (where he plays a talk show host):
    He also befuddled them as he befuddles all his guests, who don't know quite how to take him and so sit precariously, hilariously off balance. Tonight the guests are Rob Lowe and Billy Crystal. Glick tells Lowe, who stars on "The West Wing," that, darn it, he's never seen the series but has meant to and is surprised to learn the title refers to part of the White House. But then he is preoccupied with the fact that someone, some heartless fiend, has made off with a set of cuff links bearing the likenesses of Ben Affleck on the one and Matt Damon on the other.
  • Yet another Howard Zinn article, this one more recent (but date unknown) from identitytheory.com:
    RB: I take it you are heartened and hopeful about the forthcoming film version of A People's History?
    HZ: Well, I'm half-hopeful [both laugh]. Anybody that deals with Hollywood, anybody who deals with the film industry has to be very cautious. I'm not at all sure that the book will be turned into film although HBO has signed contracts with three writers. Each of whom will write a two-hour script. Howard Fast to do the revolutionary War, John Sayles to do something on the Lowell Mill girls, and a Scottish writer, Paul Laverty, to do something on Columbus and Las Casas. So HBO has agreed to finance the scripts, and after the scripts are done they will decide whether they will make a film. That's standard procedure in Hollywood. They are very often are willing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for the writing of scripts and then not make a film because the film will cost 5 or 10 million dollars. So, that's why I say it's still up in the air. Yes, I'm half-hopeful, especially because we have good writers.
    RB: I've been collecting stories about how long some projects take. Ed Harris' Pollack took 8 years...
    HZ: Oh yeah. The bureaucracy in both film and television is amazing. The films take years to do and in the meantime the bureaucracy changes hands. All sorts of things happen...
    RB: You are listed as an executive producer. Is that a titular position or are you actively involved?
    HZ: No, it's real. There are four executive producers. They call us the Gang of Four. Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, me and Chris Moore. Yeah, we will supervise and, of course, HBO will have final say over things. We have been involved in choosing the writers, going over the scripts and be involved at every stage of the process. The idea of us being executive producers is really to stand guard over the sanctity of the point of view of People's History so that Howard Fast's story of the mutinies in the Revolutionary Army doesn't become Mel Gibson's The Patriot.

• Rachel wrote:
  I was reading a "98" Matt Damon bio and came across a cute little story, and for those of you who haven't seen it;
  Jay Jones (Matt's second father) recalled the day that Matt decided that he was ready to give up his beloved pacifier. As the garbage truck pulled up to the house, Matt stubbornly marched outside and heaved it into the truck himself.
  We always hear what wonderful things he is doing now, but embarrassing story's from parents are good too!
• Felicity's finds:
  • Really random stuff here. The new issue of Good Housekeeping has an interview with Julia Roberts conducted by Liz Smith. And it mentions Ocean's 11.
  • I can't work out the this paragraph. From fotograma.com
    Damon estar� acompa�ado por Casey Affleck (el hermano de Ben) y, de acuerdo con publicaciones de chismes de Los Angeles, se tratar� de una pel�cula mediocre que, de no ser por la locaci�n, pasar�a desaparcibida totalmente para los argentinos. "Variety" asegur� incluso que se parecer� a anteriores pel�culas de Van Sant, como "Los marginados" o "Mi mundo privado".
  • A brief French interview with Matt, plus photos: http://www.serialweb.com/reportage/report.php3?NUMREPORT=346
    Includes this quote: A chaque audition, tu es oblig� de mentir. Mon dernier mensonge en date : on m'a demand� lors d'un casting si je savais monter � cheval. J'avoue, c'est pas mon point fort. J'ai quand m�me r�pondu avec le sourire " je ne sais faire que �a, ma m�re est une jument "
    (translated): Ripley is a bluffer. The world of the show biz is a universe of liars. Which is your last lie?
    With each hearing, you are obliged to lie. My last lie in date: one asked me at the time of a casting if I could ride a horse. I acknowledge, it is not my strong point. I nevertheless answered with the smile " I can do only that, my mother is a mare "
  • And a Pretty Horses collage pic, captioned with the French title, at http://www.serialweb.com/cine_spectacle/fiche_cine.php3?NUMFILM=206&TIME=&NU MARTIST=820&NUMCATEGORY=
  • More on the suspension of filming on Jerry, from La Guia (Salta paper): Rodaje bajo cero
    Por culpa de una nevada en el Valle de Luna, se suspendi� el rodaje de Jerry, la pel�cula que Gus Van Sant filmaba en Argentina con Matt Damon y Casey Affleck. Seg�n cont� a Clar�n el productor argentino Enrique Bacher, de Altana Films, "se hizo la tercera parte, pero los actores no pod�an seguir filmando con fr�o".
    Translated:
    Running below cero Because of a Nevada in the Moon Valley, the running of Jerry was suspended, the film that Gus Van Sant filmed in Argentina with Matt Damon and Casey Affleck. According to Enrique Bacher, of Variable told to Bugler the Argentine producer Films, " became the third part, but the actors could not continue filming with cold ".
    Can anyone work out the last sentence re third part? Was there a third of the filming remaining?
  • And another story from La Guia, translated version this time, from 16 June:
    In the province of San Juan, in a locality that takes the name of San Agust�n of the Fertile Valley began the shooting of Jerry the day before yesterday, the film that the director of Discovering Forrester, Gus Van Sant (whom also My world did deprived, In search of the destiny and remake of Psic�sis) is doing with Matt Damon and Casey Affleck. One knows that the shooting will stay under strict secret and that they do not wish interferences of the press nor of peculiar. Soon of the Fertile Valley, and following the passage of the protagonists, the equipment will be transferred to Ifchigualasto, in the Valley of the Moon and of there to Talampaya, already in the Rioja. It is centered in the history of these two friends and the death of one of them in mysterious circumstances, by which first it is accused. Jerry has the independent structure and the budget of first films of Van Sant, and will have to be finished for end of this month. The budget, assures the local part the production, is much smaller than the 7 million dollars that the American press reported when in Cannes the project announced.
  • With the contract talks almost complete, the shooting could continue shortly. And a number of independent films, mostly shooting outside the US, have been given permission to continue. So if there is still filming to be done, it is likely to be completed soon.
  • And there's a segment on ET Tuesday with Mark Hamill about his Jay and Silent Bob role.
  (If you can translate any of the paragraphs mentioned by Felicity, please do write me)

• Cass from Argentina wrote:
  I want to say that there was a strong snow storm in La Rioja, the argentinian province where Matt and Casey were filming the movie Jerry. I know they are not going to continue with it here, I don't know what's going to be Gus V. Sant decision. That's all I know. Kisses to all
  (And a big thanks to you, Cass!)

• More from Felicity:
  • More Mark Wahlberg stories: Apparently Matt was in Paris when Wahlberg had his birthday in the last few weeks (June 3), and dropped in on the party. This is from a messageboard on Wahlberg's official website: can't give out all the details, you will just have to use your imagination, however at the end of the evening Matt Damon showed up to wish Mark a happy b-day, that was cool of Mat,
  • On Jordana Brewster - she's actually 21 (born April 1980).
• Stacey wrote:
  For the US fans - the original Ocean's Eleven is scheduled to air this Wednesday at 10am (eastern time) on Turner Classic Movies. It's probably airing nationally, but check your local listings to be sure.

• Felicity wrote:
  A quote from Mark Wahlberg on the rumor that he broke up Matt and Winona's relationship:
  A: The Winona rumour was really ridiculous. I did not break up her relationship with Matt Damon. I've met Matt. He's a really nice guy. Winona and I had met a few times to talk about doing a movie together. The project never materialized. That's all there ever was to that.
  Wahlberg is also on the cover of the next Vanity Fair (to promote Planet of the Apes). And in a beautifully timed coincidence, from a gossip forum (www.style.com) today, this note:
  I just saw Matt Damon & Jordana at a bar called Duke's Barefoot Bar in Malibu!!!
  They were sitting with three other people in a booth. Matt and Jordana we sitting next to each other very close. Everyone was smoking and drinking. They stayed about an hour and left together!
  Jordana Brewster is Mark Wahlberg's ex (aged 20 - they went out for three years), and attends Yale. And as Val pointed out recently, she was the studio's pick for 'All The Pretty Horses'.
  It's probably completely false, but I do like the rumour, although she is very young...
• And Val sent in a link to this Yahoo article, which mentions Matt:
  Archerd: ``A.I.'' star Osment eyes villain role

• For info: Anthony Minghella was awarded a CBE in the Queen's Honors list on 16 June.
• I found an interview with Ben in Clarin (Argentina paper) promoting Pearl Harbor, published Thursday. This is the rough Alta Vista translation - maybe someone can do it better (but it's perhaps more fun like this). Original source at http://www.clarin.com.ar/diario/2001-06-27/c-01201.htm
  Q- What you would do if you found out, for example, that your better friend, Matt Damon, one lay down with your fiancee? A - It would have to do just like I did to him to Josh Hartnett in the film: to stick a fragmentation hand grenade to him (laughter). Pero Matt and I have not had that experience exactly, so this is single a hypothetical question, but I am not safe... He would hurt to me, he would return to me crazy and finally he would ask to him: What? Eras heterosexual? (Laughter)
  Q - What pens�s of the project that it has with your brother Casey, to film a film in Argentina (they are rolling by these days, in the Rioja, directed by Gus Van Sant)? A - I was reading that script and it excited much to me. I was with other things and I could not participate. But it gave desire me to put to me to write. It would enchant to me to return to work with my two boys.
  Q - the relation that ten�s with Hartnett in Pearl Harbor is similar to whom ten�s with Matt in the life? A - the inverted rolls are something. Matt is two years greater than I and the personage of Josh is more like a smaller brother. But somehow I talked about my own life to do it because, in fact, I am an older brother. I felt identified in that to want to take care of to somebody, that it does not run risks, perhaps truncating its growth and not letting make it the things that it wants to do.
• The news of Jack Lemmon's death was unexpected, and marked the passing of an era. In 98, Lemmon and Matthau presented the Oscar to Matt and Ben, now they're both gone. And Matt appeared in his last film. A strange connection.

• Kristin wrote:
  I don't know if anyone else caught it, but I was flipping through the channels before going out last night and happened to see the movie The Good Old Boys on TNN. Actually, I first saw Tommy Lee Jones' name on the opening credits and somehow I remembered that Matt was in a cowboy movie with him a while ago. Then I saw Matt's name and was happy to have stumbled upon the movie. He looked very cute and as always, gave a wonderful performance. Now that I think about it, he's spent a lot of time acting on horses.
• From Felicity:
  • Finally, we have some news, and it probably signifies that Matt's finished in Argentina. From the Boston Globe Tuesday:
    Something borrowed
    There he was on a beautiful Sunday afternoon: Matt Damon posing for pictures with blushing brides. Could one of the country's most eligible bachelors, according to the infallible People magazine, be leaving life as a singleton? Nah. Damon was at the Andover Country Club golfing with his father, Kent, a club member, and two others. With three wedding parties celebrating their nuptials at the club, the word spread quickly that the actor was on the grounds. After finishing the 18th, Damon, ever the agreeable chap, waved, shook hands, and posed for pictures - no doubt delighting a few brides. As to the grooms, we're sure they took it in stride.
  • According to the Boston Herald, Ben's also in Boston.
  • To follow up on the People article - Meredith Salenger's official site: http://www.celebrityblvd.com/meredithsalenger/indexsalenger.htm
    From a fan site at http://www.webspawner.com/users/MeredithSalenger/:
    Meredith also completed working on another romantic comedy called, "Good Advice" with Charlie Sheen and Denise Richards. And has a turn in the new Mirimax romantic comedy, "The Third Wheel" which stars Luke Wilson, Denise Richards, Jay Lacopo, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck.
    Denise and Meredith did a television Pilot for ABC together in 1995 and have been great friends since then. They were so excited when they were cast to play best friends in this film as well. This film also puts Meredith in the film with her best friend from college, Matt Damon! Meredith and Matt went to Harvard together and met the first day of freshman year and became great friends! (After college... Matt set his two best pals up together - and Meredith and Ben started dating!)
    She also appeared in Glory Daze, as did quite a few of their friends.
  • A new pic from an ebay item: http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1441999910
    (My note: We've seen this pic before, but it's worth seeing again. )
  • From the Marilyn Beck/Stacy Jenel Smith column:
    DOWN TIME: It looks like Matt Damon will have a spell of leisure. Since the beginning of the month he's been in Argentina making Gus Van Sant's low-budget "Jerry," but has no other projects set. "Jerry," which co-stars Casey Affleck, is being described as "Two Guys in the Desert." With a scant $7 million budget on the project, Damon's working for far -- far -- less than his usual salary, in exchange for a piece of the gross.
  • More information on the Howard Zinn project - from Digress Magazine (old article):
    DB: Just one more question that I have to ask. I have to hear about your miniseries.
    HZ: The miniseries?! What do you know about that?
    DB: Well, I know about your relationship with certain Hollywood superstars [Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, etc.]
    HZ: Oh, I see. Well, it came about because a Hollywood agent was having dinner with a friend of his who is a vice president with Fox television Leon Orman[?] named Marcy Pool. This agent, Paul Allen Smith, was told by the vice president that her boss at Fox asked her to find a big project, something that would make Fox look more serious (laughs). They felt Fox is sometimes looked upon contemptuously (and rightly so). So, she was telling him all this at dinner and he had just sort of become a "political person's agent", started listening to Noam Chomsky, started reading my stuff, and he said, well, how about A People's History of the United States as a big project and she said "Oh, I read it in college. Ill reread it over the weekend." She rereads it and says "ok, I'm going to pitch it to my boss, but before I pitch it to my boss, however, I've got to have some stars attached to it. Who'll we get? Ah! Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, Good Will Hunting, all of that. So she got in touch with them and they immediately said yes. She approached her bosses and they said yes. And so, for a year- all of this is leading up to a collapse- we had meetings in L.A. and New York and Boston. Matt and Ben and I and Chris Nord[?], a producer of Good Will Hunting who's a friend of theirs- we began referring to ourselves as the Gang of Four- were going to be the executives producers on this project so that we could have total control over what happened. We had all these meetings and started making all these plans and we all got contracts and money. But after all that, Fox changed their minds.
    DB: With explanation?
    HZ: Well, we had hired a writer, a very good writer, a fellow who had worked with Warren Beatty on Bulworth, very left in fact. He wrote an outline for a 12 hour series. [Fox] looked at the outline and said "this isn't entertaining." That's exactly what they said, and they essentially said forget it. But I don't think it was the outline that turned them off. It was just that they had second thoughts. Maybe they finally read the book! (laughs) At first they were dazzled by stars and then they read the book and thought "are we really going to do this?" I'm just guessing about their motivation, but they left us and now we're looking for other networks. In fact, just two days ago, I had a conference call with Matt, Ben, and Chris. Matt was in South Carolina shooting a Robert Redford film, Ben Affleck had just finished a movie called Bounce, and Chris was just finishing a movie called Squelch (laughs). It was really funny. Basically we were going over our strategy. My agent, Paul Allen Smith- he had suddenly become my Hollywood agent- has been approaching these networks. NBC and ABC are interested, and TNT and HBO are interested. So, the four of us are talking in this conference call about when we can approach them. [Matt and Ben] are terrific guys. They're very socially aware and right on the ball. They see through all of the glitz and glitter of Hollywood even though it surrounds them all the time.

• From Felicity:
  Here's another photo (see right) from the Advocate, taken to promote Ripley. Is it on the web??
  It's the faded look (via my scanner), but it picks up the features better. Again, the colours could be really off.

• C. wrote:
  Hi! You don't think that's a totally hot picture of him? It's always been one of my favorites! It would be better if his hair was poofed up a little more, and with more of his blond showing through, but other than that I find the picture to be way, way, sexy. Just the way his whole... (okay, nevermind, it's not that kind of column.) I think the People spread is over-doing his "nice guy image" though. I don't think he's quite that squeaky clean.
  Just some quick thoughts on it. Keep up the excellent work!
  (Assuming that C. is referring to the feature pic of Matt on the scooter (from the "Ripley" shoot), I totally agree. I was reminded of the pic by Felicity, who sent in a version that she scanned. As I told her: I was seriously disappointed that Matt was never shown like that in "Ripley" - it could have stopped some of that talk about Jude Law being the better of the two. ).

• Val wrote:
  Read Franke's comments at:
  http://mrshowbiz.go.com/celebrities/interviews/611_1.html
  (Note: Franke is Matt's co-star in the upcoming "Bourne Identity", and she has a movie that's opening in this country - read the relevant parts of her comments below.)

• More news from Felicity, with commentary:
  • Excerpts from the Mr.ShowBiz article on Polenta:
    Are you still working on The Bourne Identity?
    We just wrapped the last scene in Greece; the rest was shot in Paris and [the Czech city of] Prague.
    Why was the release date moved back from early September to next year?
    [Nods] When I heard they wanted to have it ready for September, I was thinking, "No way to do it in the fall." We needed to shoot a bit more and it's a big thing to get us [Matt Damon, director Doug Liman, and Potente] together. It makes more sense this way. The strike would have made a problem for press.
    Did you worry that you'd feel lost in a big Hollywood production like Bourne, since you're used to smaller films?
    Amazingly, not really. Although everybody around me was fearing that and trying to prepare me for that. I'd done Blow, which was less money but more American than Bourne, which was shot in Europe. I was German in the movie and didn't have to transform into an American as I did for Blow. There were two major differences from my point of view. First, the language, and second, the director of photography leaves the camera to an operator. You talk a lot to the director of photography, and if it's an operator, sometimes you don't know the name of the guy. It's weird but OK.
    But wasn't this big-money, big-deal filmmaking?
    The money, it's $70 million and I didn't feel it, which is good. Sometimes I realized whenever decisions are to be made, like changing the script, you just couldn't do it � a lot of people would be involved. Frank Marshall was the producer and very cool. He'd always take the time to talk to us and I'm interested in the pre- and post-production of a movie as well.
    How did you like working with Matt Damon?
    Matt is good, he's very clear. We'd have endless discussions, especially with a thriller, to reconfirm where you stand, which was sometimes hard [for me] in English. And it was all men; I was the only woman there. All the producers, the director, Matt, everybody's a guy, and sometimes you come from a different standpoint if you're a woman, and Matt did a good job of listening to me and helping me.
    Do you think a high-profile film like Bourne will worsen your struggle with fame?
    I'm the total civilian in that story � and that's Franka with Hollywood. The normal girl suddenly thrown into thriller environment: "What the fuck is going on?" I'm more mature as the film goes, but in a metaphorical way, it's becoming an actress who's known. It's like entering Hollywood.
    I thought Franka's comments were fairly muted - Matt is good and clear?? She was briefly mentioned on ET today, but there was lot more text online, and no footage shown. Franka also has a major article in the LA Times today.
  • A night out by Courtney Love and Winona Ryder was in the NY Daily News a few days ago, and it's got a few other sources today. The relevance is summarised in USA Today:
    Love was out Monday for the New Group theater company spring gala in Manhattan. She was mobbed at the new Hugo Boss store on Fifth Avenue before a dinner at the Russian Tea Room. There, Love let loose, dancing on tabletops, making unprintable quips about Russell Crowe and Matt Damon. She and pal Winona Ryder joined in a duet of the Johnny Cash song Long Black Veil.
    As to why Courtney was making comments on Matt, who knows, but presumably it was the presence of Winona.
  • The quotes in People are strange, as none have commented publicly on Matt before. Meredith Salenger did go to Harvard with Matt and is a wannabe actress (appeared in Third Wheel). She has a website in which she mentions her friendship with Matt, but I've never seen her referenced before.
  • The latest Premiere magazine has a review of ATPH (pretty negative and asks where the extras on the DVD are), and a small item in the story on Tom Clancy (mostly relating to the Sum of All Fears film with Ben). Remember that Clancy has a framed poster of GWH in his home, and bonded with Ben when they met. From the mag:
    "The studio will likely recast [spin-off character John Clark, a free-wheeling CIA operative] the role once again before Rainbow Six starts filming, with an eye toward establishing another long-running franchise. And if Clancy has a say in it, someone along the lines of Matt Damon will play the part."

Click on a link

Still photos from Good Will Hunting.
USA Weekly November 2000 article, "Ace of Clubs" y by Craigh Barboza.
Local boys making 'Good' a Boston Herald article from the GWH days
The Advocate (12/99) interview by Brendan Lemon.
Some of my personal favorite pictures of Matt
The Talented Mr.Ripley page
The All the Pretty Horses page
The Bagger Vance page
Matt at Fenway Park for the 1999 Major League Baseball All Stars
The Details magazine article, as appeared in the London Telegraph.
Janel Maslin's NY Times Review of GWH , in which she called Matt "very much the supernova".
An article about pre-GWH videos of Matt Damon/
Archive of Past Matt Columns

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