Ben Affleck is addressing the “massive embarrassment” he experienced after the Oscars snubbed him in the Best Director category.
Affleck, 53, appeared Jimmy Kimmel Live! on Monday, January 5, and recalled his reaction to learning in 2013 that he was not nominated to direct the thriller Argowhich eventually won the Oscar for Best Picture that year.
“It was the year, the horrible one where everyone was telling you, ‘You’re going to be nominated, you’re going to be nominated for director,'” Affleck told the host. Jimmy Kimmel58, adding: “And so, of course, I wake up that morning and by the way, and by the way, it’s not (unlike) any other morning that I haven’t been nominated for Best Director. But all of a sudden it’s a huge shame. I woke up and people (said), “You were not nominated.’”
Kimmel confessed that he thought about Affleck while watching Leonardo DiCaprio lose the best actor award Timothée Chalamet at the Critics’ Choice Awards the night before. Meanwhile, One battle after another — the film starring DiCaprio, 51 — won best picture and best director at the ceremony.
Steven Spielberg once refused to direct Ben Affleck in a movie, claims filmmaker Mike Binder. Appearing on a recent episode of Stephen Baldwin’s “One Bad Movie” podcast, Binder, 67, said he and Spielberg, 79, had been in talks for the latter to direct Man About Town, which hit theaters in 2006 and starred (…)
“I was thinking, boy, he’s got a lot better places to be,” Kimmel joked of DiCaprio. “And the film wins the best film, the director Paul Thomas Anderson he wins best director, and then he doesn’t win. And I’m thinking he must be so angry that (he had to leave) whatever he was flown in, a yacht somewhere, and he couldn’t be there anymore. He has come to lose.”
Kimmel’s sympathy for DiCaprio evoked Affleck’s Argo resentment, “Because this is maybe the worst awards show situation ever,” he thought. “I think you’re underestimating this. Because Argonot only was it nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture, you he won best movie You starred in it and you directed it, and you weren’t nominated in either category…it’s like the movie directed itself.”
Affleck admitted he “felt” the same way at the time. On the day the Oscar nominations were announced, she attended the 18th Critics’ Choice Awards in January 2013 and faced a line of reporters on the red carpet.
“It felt like there were 500 people dying to talk to me,” he recalled. “And each of them (said), ‘Hello, then, resentment.’ How about that? ‘Ha, ha, ha, yes. It’s a shame.'”
However, on a brighter note, he ended up winning the Best Director award Argo that night, overcoming Steven Spielberg for Lincoln i Kathryn Bigelow for Zero Dark Thirty.
“This negative event turns into a positive,” said Affleck, who congratulated Kimmel winning the 2026 Critics’ Choice Award for Best Talk Show.
The actor, there to promote The Riphis next film with Matt Damonread Kimmel a sarcastic note from Damon, 55, whom he quoted when he wrote, “You should have been canceled a long time ago. Maybe then I would have gotten sympathy for winning more than a minor movie award.”
Kimmel’s eponymous talk show was taken off the air briefly in September 2025 amid backlash over his comment on the murder of a right-wing political activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot dead that same month while speaking at Utah Valley University.
A boy from Boston even. Ben Affleck has been a Hollywood star for more than two decades, but he’s never forgotten his New England roots (or his love of Dunkin’ coffee). Born in Berkeley, California, the avid Red Sox fan moved to Massachusetts with his family when he was just 3 years old. He (…)
While accepting the trophy at Sunday’s event in Santa Monica, California, Kimmel thanked “all the writers and actors and producers and union members, so many of you in this room who supported us, who stepped forward with us and reminded us that we don’t take free speech in this city or this country for granted. Your actions were important and we appreciate them.”