Ben Affleck says recognizing two older boys may have gotten him out of a knifepoint robbery when he was a teenager growing up in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The actor recalled walking home from high school when the boys crossed the street toward him, grabbed him and demanded money. Affleck said he was frightened until he got a better look at them.
He knew the boys from playing baseball, and they recognized him too. “I guess I’m off the hook,” Affleck remembered thinking after the confrontation abruptly eased.
Affleck shared the story during the Sept. 30 premiere of Kerry Washington’s Street You Grew Up On podcast. The encounter became more disturbing in retrospect when he learned what happened to one of the boys several years later.
Affleck Says He Was ‘Scared’ When the Boys Pulled a Knife
Washington asked Affleck whether he had ever been robbed while growing up in Cambridge. He recalled being “14 maybe” when he noticed two older boys wearing what he described as literal hoods across the street while he was walking home from high school.
Affleck briefly considered running as they approached but kept walking. The boys passed him before grabbing him and producing a knife. “I was scared,” he said, according to PEOPLE.
Looking at them more closely, Affleck realized they were older boys he knew from baseball. They recognized him as well, changing the encounter before he was physically harmed.
Affleck also admitted that he never told his mother what had happened because he did not want to worry her. As a father himself, he said that decision has stayed with him because he now repeatedly encourages his own children to tell him anything.
One of the Boys Later Spent 20 Years in Prison, Affleck Says
Affleck told Washington that one of the boys later committed a fatal knife attack.
“That kid who robbed me ended up, I don’t know, three or four years later, killing somebody with a knife and going to prison for 20 years,” he said. Affleck did not identify the boy, but said the fatal stabbing happened three or four years after their encounter and resulted in a 20-year prison sentence.
Affleck Remembered Violence and Social Divisions in Cambridge
The robbery surfaced during a broader conversation about Affleck’s childhood on Cottage Street in Cambridge. He described a working-class community where some families struggled financially and where violence did not feel entirely removed from everyday life.
Affleck recalled starting high school in 1986, five years after a student had been killed there during what he described as a race fight. He remembered an intense awareness of ethnicity and different social groups, while friendships among children could cross those divisions.
His Cambridge memories also included people who encouraged his interest in acting. Affleck credited drama teacher Jerry Speca with helping him and Matt Damon develop enough confidence to consider themselves writers as well as performers.
“Matt and I would never have written [Good Will Hunting] or thought we could write or were writers if we had not been in that class,” Affleck told Washington.
Affleck and Matt Damon Turned Their Friendship Into ‘Good Will Hunting’
Affleck and Damon knew each other growing up around Cambridge years before either became a Hollywood star. Their friendship eventually produced the screenplay that changed both of their careers.
In a 2020 SiriusXM interview, Affleck explained that Damon began developing an early version of Good Will Hunting while taking a college class. The project gradually became a screenplay they worked on together.
The finished film arrived in 1997 with Damon playing Will Hunting and Affleck appearing as his friend Chuckie Sullivan. Robin Williams, Minnie Driver and Stellan Skarsgård also starred.
Affleck and Damon won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 1998. They later extended their professional partnership through Artists Equity, the production company they founded with Gerry Cardinale.
Kerry Washington and Affleck Reunite in Netflix’s ‘Animals’
The podcast episode arrived shortly before Washington and Affleck appear together in Animals, a thriller directed and co-written by Affleck.
Affleck plays Mark Kimball, a Los Angeles mayoral candidate whose son is kidnapped. Washington plays his wife, Abigail, as the couple tries to raise the ransom while secrets within their marriage complicate their situation.
Netflix lists Gillian Anderson, Steven Yeun, Adriana Paz and Luis Gerardo Méndez among the ensemble cast. Affleck, Connor McIntyre and Billy Ray are credited as screenwriters, with Affleck and Damon among the producers.
Animals opens in select theaters and begins streaming on Netflix on Oct. 9.