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Ben Affleck gives frank interview in fluent Spanish: His alcoholism, press hounding and Jennifer López's wedding
25/02/2020
PEARL Harbour star Ben Affleck told TV interviewers he would be 'delighted' to attend ex-fiancée Jennifer López's wedding – in perfect Spanish.
Talking of his upcoming film The Way Back, the 47-year-old star was frank and open on the talk show El Gordo y La Flaca, on the US-based Hispanic TV channel Univisión.
Affleck's character is a celebrity who could have been a legend, but fell dramatically from grace due to his addictions – the film focuses on how he attempts to claw back from the brink.
Speaking to – and being spoken to - entirely in Spanish, Affleck revealed his own battle with drink had given him plenty of background knowledge to help him in the rôle.
“I wanted to make a film that gave hope: You are not your problems; you're better than them,” said the actor from Lost.
“You can live a good life if you deal with your problems. But sometimes it's difficult. Some scenes were really easy for me to act because I'm an alcoholic, and I understand what this means and the pain that goes with it.”
He admitted that his addiction to alcohol was largely the cause of his break-up from actress girlfriend Jennifer Garner, whom he speaks highly of, having recently admitted that the biggest mistake he had ever made in his life had been to divorce her.
“I know about the pain of the divorcé, but I'm very lucky to have such a lovely ex-wife who has helped me so much, and we work together for the kids, because we both know this is the most important thing,” explains Ben, who had three children with Ms Garner – Violet Anne, 14; Seraphine Rose, 10 and Samuel, seven.
Naturally, he was asked about another of his famous ex-partners – Jennifer López who, born in the deprived and mostly-Hispanic Bronx area of New York to recent Puerto Rican immigrants and growing up surrounded by poverty and violence, exploits her Latin roots constantly in her music, producing entire albums in Spanish which, surprisingly, she does not speak completely fluently and had to learn, even though it is her parents' native language.
Affleck was in a relationship with Jennifer López – an acclaimed actress and, more recently, clothing designer with her J-Lo collection, as well as an accomplished singer-songwriter – after they met in 2001 whilst filming Gigli.
They split up in 2004, breaking off their engagement, with both of them citing relentless media attention as what wrecked their relationship – in fact, Jennifer's 'rags-to-riches' hit in which she insists she is still the Puerto Rican girl from the impoverished suburb, Jenny From the Block, was a response to the couple's being hounded constantly by the press.
“For me, it's wonderful to see her gaining the respect she deserves,” Affleck said when asked about J-Lo.
“She's a great woman. She seems very happy with her fiancé and I wish her all the best with her forthcoming marriage.”
Jennifer had already said publicly that her hoped-for wedding guests would include a number of her ex-boyfriends when she ties the know with her 44-year-old US-born ex-professional baseball player partner.
Affleck said López had asked him face to face whether he would be at the wedding, and says he smiled at her, nodded and wished her lots of luck.
The director of Argo speaks Spanish fluently because he spent a large part of his childhood living in México – but he is not the only native English-speaking celebrity with a good command of the language.
As well as Jennifer López and, of course, Gloria Estefan, who was barely two years old when her family left their native Cuba for Miami, Florida, plus Mexican-born New Yorker and guitar genius Carlos Santana, Millennium pop sensation Christina Aguilera grew up speaking Spanish as her father is Ecuadorian – but she was estranged from Fausto Aguilera for many years after he and her Irish-American mother ended their violent marriage, and she had to work hard on the language when producing her all-Spanish album from 2000, Mi Reflejo.
Actress Gwyneth Paltrow is also fluent in Spanish, since she spent a year out as a student in the Toledo-province town of Talavera de la Reina on language courses and home stays.
Gwyneth was 19 when she first visited Barcelona as a backpacker with hardly any money in her pocket, and has often returned to the country – especially to Talavera where she is named 'Adopted Daughter'.
With an estimated 50 million native Spanish-speakers, as well as its home-grown celebrities and 'mere mortals' who have learnt the language, more Spanish is spoken in the USA than in any other country in the world – in fact, its population of mother-tongue speakers is greater than that of Spain itself, which has an official headcount of 47.1 million, of whom around 11% are foreigners, including those from Spanish-speaking countries and those who speak it as a non-native language, but also a large, mostly northern European, contingent who have little or no knowledge of it.
Photograph of Ben Affleck: Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons
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PEARL Harbour star Ben Affleck told TV interviewers he would be 'delighted' to attend ex-fiancée Jennifer López's wedding – in perfect Spanish.
Talking of his upcoming film The Way Back, the 47-year-old star was frank and open on the talk show El Gordo y La Flaca, on the US-based Hispanic TV channel Univisión.
Affleck's character is a celebrity who could have been a legend, but fell dramatically from grace due to his addictions – the film focuses on how he attempts to claw back from the brink.
Speaking to – and being spoken to - entirely in Spanish, Affleck revealed his own battle with drink had given him plenty of background knowledge to help him in the rôle.
“I wanted to make a film that gave hope: You are not your problems; you're better than them,” said the actor from Lost.
“You can live a good life if you deal with your problems. But sometimes it's difficult. Some scenes were really easy for me to act because I'm an alcoholic, and I understand what this means and the pain that goes with it.”
He admitted that his addiction to alcohol was largely the cause of his break-up from actress girlfriend Jennifer Garner, whom he speaks highly of, having recently admitted that the biggest mistake he had ever made in his life had been to divorce her.
“I know about the pain of the divorcé, but I'm very lucky to have such a lovely ex-wife who has helped me so much, and we work together for the kids, because we both know this is the most important thing,” explains Ben, who had three children with Ms Garner – Violet Anne, 14; Seraphine Rose, 10 and Samuel, seven.
Naturally, he was asked about another of his famous ex-partners – Jennifer López who, born in the deprived and mostly-Hispanic Bronx area of New York to recent Puerto Rican immigrants and growing up surrounded by poverty and violence, exploits her Latin roots constantly in her music, producing entire albums in Spanish which, surprisingly, she does not speak completely fluently and had to learn, even though it is her parents' native language.
Affleck was in a relationship with Jennifer López – an acclaimed actress and, more recently, clothing designer with her J-Lo collection, as well as an accomplished singer-songwriter – after they met in 2001 whilst filming Gigli.
They split up in 2004, breaking off their engagement, with both of them citing relentless media attention as what wrecked their relationship – in fact, Jennifer's 'rags-to-riches' hit in which she insists she is still the Puerto Rican girl from the impoverished suburb, Jenny From the Block, was a response to the couple's being hounded constantly by the press.
“For me, it's wonderful to see her gaining the respect she deserves,” Affleck said when asked about J-Lo.
“She's a great woman. She seems very happy with her fiancé and I wish her all the best with her forthcoming marriage.”
Jennifer had already said publicly that her hoped-for wedding guests would include a number of her ex-boyfriends when she ties the know with her 44-year-old US-born ex-professional baseball player partner.
Affleck said López had asked him face to face whether he would be at the wedding, and says he smiled at her, nodded and wished her lots of luck.
The director of Argo speaks Spanish fluently because he spent a large part of his childhood living in México – but he is not the only native English-speaking celebrity with a good command of the language.
As well as Jennifer López and, of course, Gloria Estefan, who was barely two years old when her family left their native Cuba for Miami, Florida, plus Mexican-born New Yorker and guitar genius Carlos Santana, Millennium pop sensation Christina Aguilera grew up speaking Spanish as her father is Ecuadorian – but she was estranged from Fausto Aguilera for many years after he and her Irish-American mother ended their violent marriage, and she had to work hard on the language when producing her all-Spanish album from 2000, Mi Reflejo.
Actress Gwyneth Paltrow is also fluent in Spanish, since she spent a year out as a student in the Toledo-province town of Talavera de la Reina on language courses and home stays.
Gwyneth was 19 when she first visited Barcelona as a backpacker with hardly any money in her pocket, and has often returned to the country – especially to Talavera where she is named 'Adopted Daughter'.
With an estimated 50 million native Spanish-speakers, as well as its home-grown celebrities and 'mere mortals' who have learnt the language, more Spanish is spoken in the USA than in any other country in the world – in fact, its population of mother-tongue speakers is greater than that of Spain itself, which has an official headcount of 47.1 million, of whom around 11% are foreigners, including those from Spanish-speaking countries and those who speak it as a non-native language, but also a large, mostly northern European, contingent who have little or no knowledge of it.
Photograph of Ben Affleck: Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons
Related Topics
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