Ben Affleck & Matt Damon Were Broke Together After ‘Good Will Hunting’
Good Will Hunting was the film that launched Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s careers. The childhood friends wrote the script together, before selling it for over half a million dollars. The movie eventually earned them an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay in 1998.
Though they earned a sizeable paycheck for the script, the duo has admitted the money didn’t last them long. In fact, they were broke shortly after its release.
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Ben recently opened up about the topic during a recent appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show. After getting paid $600,000 for the script, he admitted they thought they’d be set for a while, but they were shocked when that wasn’t the case.
“When we sold ‘Good Will Hunting’ I thought we were now rich for life,” Ben explained. “My needs are over! I’ll never have to work again! I’m rich forever!”
“We sold [the script] for $600,000. We split that, $300,000 each, and then the agents got $30,000, so we had $270,000,” he continued. “We paid about $160,000 in taxes so we had $110,000. We each bought $55,000 Jeep Cherokees and then had $55,000 left.”
Ben added, “Naturally we decided to rent a $5,000-a-month party house on Glencoe Way by the Hollywood Bowl, and we were broke in six months.”
A post shared by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (@mattandben)
This isn’t the first time Ben and Matt have opened up about their past financial struggles. Last month, the actors revealed they used to have a joint bank account to help fund their careers. “It was unusual, but we needed the money for auditions,” Matt explained on The Bill Simmons podcast in March.
He explained that whenever he or Ben made money from a role, they’d put the profits in the joint account to go towards future career-related expenses, like auditions. Matt says they kept the rules of the account flexible, but called it a “weird thing in retrospect.”
“You were allowed to go to [auditions in] New York with the money,” Matt went on. “You were allowed to take out $10 and get quarters and go to [the arcade] and play video games.”
A post shared by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (@mattandben)
Ben went on to defend the account, saying it was a way for them to look after each other and prioritize their careers.
“We were going to help each other and be there for each other. It was like, ‘You’re not going to be alone. I’m not going to be alone. Let’s go out there and do this together,’” Ben explained.
The actors admitted the joint account made things complicated after a while. So, once they were earning a consistent income, they shut it down.
Now, with million-dollar fortunes to their name, Ben and Matt no longer have a practical reason to share a bank account. But if one thing is for sure, it’s that their friendship has stood the test of time.
Sources: CNBC, Buzzfeed,
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