Jennifer Garner Reveals the Dream She Thought She Lost After Divorce to Ben Affleck

Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck‘s 2015 split and subsequent divorce in 2018 was one of the most publicized celebrity breakups in recent memory, but the once contentious couple has settled into a new rhythm that focuses on being good co-parents for their children, Violet, 15, Seraphina, 12, and Samuel, 9. In a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Garner opened up on the current state of their relationship and the difficulty of going through an incredibly public divorce. “Going through [a divorce] in public is not what’s hard, going through it is what’s hard, A,” Garner explained. “And B, my children’s eyes are on me.”

In a Vanity Fair interview that ran shortly after they first separated, Garner revealed that she felt like she had “lost the dream of dancing with my husband at my daughter’s wedding.” However, Garner tells THR that things with Affleck have settled into a new, positive pattern. “When our kids get married, we’ll dance, I know that now,” she told THR. “We’ll boogaloo and have a great time. I don’t worry about that anymore.”

Affleck has said similar warm things about his ex-wife in recent interviews, explaining to Entertainment Tonight last year that being a father and going through a divorce made him a better actor for The Way Back. “For me, the movie was much more about the fact that — whether it’s having lived enough years, having seen enough ups and downs, having children and divorce, having experienced a lot of different things — I’m at a point now in my life where I have sufficient life experience to bring to a role to make it really interesting for me,” Affleck admitted. “I’m not good enough to just invent it from whole cloth, you know?”

“Growing older and having had more intense and meaningful personal experiences has made acting much more interesting for me and in turn made me drawn to the kinds of movies that are about people who are flawed,” Affleck said. “I didn’t have to do research for the alcoholism aspect of the movie — that was covered.”

Garner also opened up to THR about how the ever-present paparazzi put “so much anxiety in our little family” because there’s always “some bobo with a camera.” The masked-up world of pandemic life gave them the gift of anonymity, even at the beach. When asked by her kids why they could never just go hang out by the waves before, Garner gave them a pretty selfless answer. “I told them, ‘We’d try to go and we’d just get chased away [by the camera],’” Garner explained. “And you’re not just ruining the experience for your family, you’re ruining it for everybody. It’s like, ‘Who wants to have us around?’”