The connection between Matt Damon and Ben Affleck is stronger than it has ever been.
This forthcoming episode of Sunday TODAY with Willie Geist will have the Oppenheimer actor, who is 52 years old, as the show’s newest guest. This particular episode will commemorate the television journalist Willie Geist’s 300th original Sunday sit-down interview.
An exclusive first peek of the conversation between Willie Geist and Matt Damon has been provided to PEOPLE. In it, Damon discusses how the interaction between him and Casey Affleck, 50, has changed over the course of the years that they have collaborated professionally.
When Geist, 48, particularly asked what it was like for Damon to work with Affleck as the director of the just released sports drama Air, Damon said that it was “great” and even likened it to working with Oppenheimer’s Christopher Nolan as the director.
He stated that “great directors really give you the freedom… it’s a collaboration, it’s a partnership.” “It’s a collaboration, it’s a partnership,” he said. “You’re kind of attacking a problem together, and you’re bringing your ideas, and if a director is good, they’re receptive to [those ideas],” said one participant.
Regarding the “shorthand” that he and Ben Affleck, with whom he shared an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Good Will Hunting 25 years ago, have on set, Damon has said, “What’s really great is there’s no diplomacy.”
He said, “Trying to be polite can cause you to waste a significant amount of time.” “In the entertainment industry, particularly in the theater, they’ve developed an entire vocabulary for how to talk to somebody—basically, how to tell somebody that they’re sucking.”
However, in the case of Affleck and Damon, “We can just say, ‘You suck,'” Damon said as Affleck and Damon laughed. “Which is really a gift because it allows you to get through the bulls— faster, and you go, ‘How do we fix it?'”
Later, he elaborated by saying, “Just tell me I’ve overacting, you know what I mean?”
It was the first time that Affleck directed Damon on a feature picture, but it wasn’t the first time in general; in fact, Affleck has been mentoring his closest buddy for a very long time. The film Air marked the first time that Affleck directed Damon in any capacity.
According to IndieWire, Ben Affleck made a joke about carrying Matt Damon at a Q&A session that took place after a screening of the film in New York City in March. He said, “It’s not the first time I’ve carried him!”
Damon said, with a chuckle, that “it might seem like the first time he’s directed me,” adding, “I mean, we did high-school plays where he was like, ‘Dude, I think you should do it like this.'”
Damon made the observation that “he’s been directing me for like 40 years or something.”
Willie Geist hosts the Sunday edition of TODAY, which airs on NBC every Sunday morning at 8 a.m. ET. This next weekend, you can see him do his 300th original Sunday sit-down interview with Damon.
On July 21, Oppenheimer will be released in cinemas.