Steven Spielberg apparently once refused to direct Ben Affleck in a movie, filmmaker Mike Binder is claiming a new interview.
While appearing on Stephen Baldwin‘s One Bad Movie podcast, Mike, 67, said that he and Steven, 79, had been in talks to work together on the early 2000s movie Man About Town, which Ben, 53, starred in.
He said, ‘We gotta do something together. I want you to write something for me,’” Mike said of Steven. “At the time, we both lived up in the Palisades, and we were talking about power and struggles.”
Keep reading to find out more…Steven apparently initially planed to direct the movie, but changed his mind and agreed to produce it through his Dreamworks studio. Mike then met with Ben to lead the project.
“We make a deal that he’s gonna do it, we shake hands, he’ll do it,” Mike recalled of Ben, before alleging that Steven refused to do the movie if Ben was cast.
“I call Steven, Steven says, ‘No. Can’t do it with him. We just bombed a movie with him, he’s got that whole J.Lo thing going on now, and I have other problems with him,’” Mike said, referring to Ben and Jennifer Lopez calling off their engagement in 2004.
Mike then claimed that Steven said that Ben once mistreated his son during a pool fight.
‘My son was a little boy, he was playing in the pool, and he got out of the pool, and Ben came in fully dressed, and my son pushed Ben into the pool,’” Steven said, according to Mike. “‘And Ben got really mad at him, and he came out of the pool and picked him up and threw him back into the pool, and made my son cry.’”
Mike questioned what the point of the story was.
“I said, ‘OK, what does this have to do with anything?’” he recalled. “He says, ‘I just don’t like to work with him. Plus his last two movies bombed. Find somebody else. Anyone but him. He’s cold as hell.’ I said, ‘OK, Steven.’”
When Mike told Ben‘s team that Steven wasn’t interested in working with him, Ben apparently knew why.
“Ben calls me up, he says, ‘Did Steven Spielberg tell you I threw his kid in the water? Is that what happened? Is that why I’m not on your movie?’” Mike alleged. “I said, ‘No, he didn’t say’ — ‘Yes he did! He told you I threw his kid in the water. That’s why I’m not on the movie.’”
Ben ultimately did end up starring in Man About Town, but it was produced through Sunlight Productions and released directly to DVD in 2007.
When Ben‘s movie Argo won Best Picture at the 2013 Oscars, he and Steven were seemingly able to bury the hatchet and move on.
“He beats Spielberg [for Lincoln], and he’s at the Academy Awards, and they’re hugging,” Mike recalled. “And I text him, I’m watching on the air, I go, ‘Ben, tonight you could throw Spielberg’s whole family in the pool and get away with it.’ About an hour later, the phone rings, it’s Affleck at the Academy [Awards]. He goes, ‘That made me laugh so f–kin’ hard.”
Mike continued, “I love both these guys, and they’re both smarter than me, but they both kinda acted like idiots, and so did I. They were great guys, but at the same time, a–holes. They were like everybody else. Steven Spielberg is a genius and a great guy, but he can be an a–hole. And Ben Affleck is a great guy, and he can be a bigger a–hole. But by the same token, both of ’em can go, ‘Yeah, I can be an a–hole.’”
Back in 2023, Steven revealed why he turned down the opportunity to direct the Harry Potter movies.
Source: justjared.com