Ben Affleck it opened on its own They are Samuelthe interest in sports betting and how the activity runs in the family’s DNA.
“My son asked me a month ago, (he) said, ‘Hey, hey, can I get like $100 to bet on sports?'” Affleck shared during a Monday, Jan. 5, appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! “It’s like, what? (It’s like) ‘My friends get $100, but if they lose, that’s it.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s a real standard, what discipline! Like, so you don’t cringe again saying, ‘I know Green Bay’s going to cover the end in the second half.’
Admission came after the Batman actor, who shares children Violet, 20, Seraphina, 17, and Samuel, 13, with ex-wife Jennifer Garnerrevealed that his father used to be a bookie.
“My dad worked in a bar, but he mostly made his money as a small-time bookie,” explained Affleck, whose family moved to Massachusetts when he was 3 years old. “I remember our first washing machine, our first VCR, actually, dad came home like, ‘You can thank Steve Grogan,’ the Patriots quarterback, for that. ‘Everybody keeps betting (on) the Patriots to win the spread.’ And so he was very thankful that the Patriots were terrible; just thank Steve Grogan’s knees for our VCR.”
“It was embarrassing and kind of illegal at the time. I mean, the statute of limitations has run out. I’m sorry, dad,” Affleck continued about the sports betting, to which the host Jimmy Kimmel he replied: “It wasn’t a little illegal at the time, it was totally illegal. It was very illegal. Everybody was doing it, but it was illegal.”
Affleck then clarified his comments, agreeing: “It was straight up illegal. It was criminal. But it was like something you had to worry about, yeah.”
Kimmel, 58, said everyone is still rooting for the New England Patriots, the Boston Red Sox or the Boston Celtics.
“Whatever happens… We never seem to learn,” Affleck added. “We’ll bet the home team, and they never beat the spread, and the bookies made a lot of money. I think it was like $10 or $20 bets.”
Kimmel joked that Affleck’s father still made “enough” money to buy him a VCR, and “those were expensive in those days.”
For Affleck, having a VCR was “the coolest thing in the world because you could record live shows.” Some of his favorites to watch were Magnum, PI i Simon & Simonbut Affleck also took to recording his own TV commercials on his VCR.
“When I began to actI did a Burger King commercial, so I was constantly waiting to record it if it came on, but I didn’t know when it was going to come on, so you had to press pause and record at the same time so it would be ready,” he recalled. “I was just standing there during commercial breaks like, ‘No, I didn’t do my Burger King commercial,’ and then I had to record it so soon.”
Of course, the Burger King commercials were just the beginning of this winner of two Academy Awards and three-time Golden Globe winner. Fans can see Affleck in the action thriller The Rip with a longtime partner Matt Damon at the end of this month.
“A group of Miami cops uncovers a stash of millions in cash, sparking mistrust as outsiders learn of the massive seizure, making them question who to trust,” according to the film’s official synopsis.
The Rip will be available to stream on Netflix on Friday, January 16.