Move over Matt and Ben — Chris and Ben are our new favorite Hollywood bromance
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Any truly great bromance begins with a meet-cute — and such was the case for Chris Messina and Ben Affleck.
Though Messina had done a Kenneth Lonergan play with Affleck's brother, Casey, the two had never met until they were seated at the same table at a mutual friend's wedding circa 2011. "They were showing a slideshow or something," Messina remembers. "And I said out loud to the table, 'Would it be weird if I put that on my acting reel right now?' And Ben cracked up, and from that day forward, we were friends. I guess he got my wise-ass Long Island mode."
Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images Chris Messina and Ben Affleck at the 2017 'Live By Night' premiere in Paris
This chance meeting led to one of the most fruitful and enduring creative partnerships of Messina's career. "We were enjoying each other's company, and I didn't really think anything of it other than I liked him — and a few months later, I got an offer to be in Argo," recalls Messina, who plays a supporting role as a CIA operative in the 2012 movie. "I couldn't believe it. I thought they had something wrong. That somebody had made a mistake."
Argo, of course, went on to win Best Picture at the Academy Awards, but for Messina, the greater victory was the creative bond it established between him and Affleck. Messina thinks it's their upbringings and mutual love of film that really brought them together. "I've never talked about this with him, but, obviously, he's from Boston, I'm from Long Island. We are East Coast guys," he reflects. "He grew up differently and we didn't know each other, but I can see a similarity in these two East Coast kids that just wanted to do this acting thing and fell in love with the movies."
It was that love of movies that fed their partnership off-set as well. Messina says he's always had a passion for directing (his debut feature, Alex of Venice, premiered in 2014), and he was eager to soak up everything he could from Affleck on the set of Argo.
Everett Collection Chris Messina as a CIA operative in 'Argo'
"On days that I had off, I'd come and watch Alan Arkin and John Goodman," he says. "And Ben let me stand alongside him and observe."
With that rapport established, Messina landed an even bigger role in Affleck's next film, 2016's Live By Night. Playing against type as husky gangster Dion Bartolo, he is the best friend and right-hand man to Affleck's Joe Coughlin. Messina says Affleck's ability to see him for more than just his typical roles makes him appreciate their partnership all the more.
"In this business, everybody talks on both sides of their mouths," he notes. "There's a lot of people that promise and say, 'We gotta do something' and 'I'm looking for something.' Ben's been one of those people that he says it and then he does it. So I had heard about Live By Night, and I had heard that he was interested in casting me. There were a lot of people that thought I wasn't right for that role. A lot of other actors were perfect for it and wanted it, and he went with me. It's incredible in this business when someone sees you in different lights and lets you stretch as an actor rather than playing the same thing over and over."
Everett Collection Ben Affleck and Chris Messina in 'Live By Night'
Live By Night afforded Messina the opportunity to more intimately observe Affleck's directing process, particularly in scenes where the actor had to direct himself. "Live By Night was so cool because we had all our scenes together," he says. "So, we would do a couple takes and then when we'd go back to playback and we'd watch it, he would give me notes and I would say, 'Maybe I should go faster here.' He's like, 'Yeah, try that there, I'll do that.' We'd do a couple takes and we'd go watch it again, and then he'd know when he was ready to move on or not. That was such a luxury because you were acting in this cool genre film and then you were getting to watch him see what was missing, what he needed, and when he had it."
Naturally, then, when it came time for Affleck's latest venture, Air, in theaters now, it didn't take much convincing for Messina to sign on. "I was like, 'I don't even need to read it,'" he says, with a laugh.
If Bartolo was against type, then so is Messina's turn as ruthless sports agent David Falk, who profanes his way through protecting his star client, Michael Jordan, when Nike courts the rising basketball star with his own line of shoes, the Air Jordans. Messina says the character and story boast the kind of "movie moments" that made him pursue acting. "There's a passion to Falk that I believe I have," says Messina. "We're both from Long Island. There's a scrappiness that I have. He's a much more intelligent man than me, much more sophisticated than I am. I do have an anger and a fire. But I don't often get to show it in movies."
Ana Carballosa/Prime Chris Messina as David Falk in 'Air'
Messina chalks that up to his early success in romantic films that painted him as a supportive, charming, downright nice partner. "Once you do something decent in Hollywood, they want you to keep doing it," he laments. "I was eating Amy Adams' food in Julie & Julia and telling her how much I adored it. And I was pining over Rebecca Hall in Vicky Christina Barcelona, and people want you to do that thing. I'm so lucky that I found such a talented director that goes, 'You know, I see much more.'"
Affleck's "vote of confidence" in Messina's range is one of the reasons he is eager to keep working with Affleck, who he calls his "biggest cheerleader."
"There are a lot of attributes to a great director, but a great director knows that every actor comes with a gift," he says. "And it's partly their job to let that gift out. Ben trusts the people he hires both on screen and off, and he gives them wings to fly. That's the greatest thing you can do for an actor — trust in them."
Michael Loccisano/Getty Ben Affleck and Chris Messina at the 2023 SXSW premiere of 'Air'
Since the success of Good Will Hunting in 1997, Affleck and Damon have been one of Hollywood's most enduring duos, real-life best friends who grew up together and made good writing their own ticket to Hollywood. While that partnership is still going strong and continues with Air, Affleck and Messina could be the new ones to watch — and Messina is game for it.
"Yeah. Matt's out," Messina jokes. "'It's me and you, Ben. I'm ready for Matt to sit the next one out. Enough of these guys. You're gonna direct me in the lead.' But no, honestly, however he saw fit, I would be there, whether that be one scene or the lead of the film. I would be there in a second. I would work on the crew. I love watching him work — both as an actor and a director."
In all seriousness, Messina says Good Will Hunting was something of a creative compass for him when he was predominantly a theater actor and dreaming of a career in Hollywood. "I was so jealous of them," he confesses. "They're about my age. And I was like, 'You can do that? You can write your own movie and star in it?' I was so lost at that age. So then to be in a room with them rehearsing and working through stuff — even though I had known them, every now and then [I would think about] when I was at the Angelika Theater in New York watching Good Will Hunting with a bunch of my friends, and now I'm here."
Alex G. Harper for EW 'Air' star Chris Messina
If Matt and Ben are the boyhood besties we love to root for, what sums up Chris and Ben as a duo? Messina sees it as more of a mentor-mentee situation, where they get artistic fulfillment from the things that piqued their attraction to filmmaking in the first place.
"Maybe I remind him of that East Coast kid who had this great love of acting and the movies," he reflects. "Ben tries to hold me up and carry me along and show me new ways."
And Messina hopes, perhaps, one day he'll get to employ those learned techniques — with their roles swapped. "I'd love to direct him in a movie," confesses Messina. "He doesn't really know my passion for directing so much. We talked about it a little bit, but I haven't really shared that with him as much. But I would love to put him in something. He's a tremendous actor and it'd be fun to do with him what he does with me. Do something that no one knows he can do and shake it up in a way that people are super surprised. I just have to find the right material."
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