Actress Jennifer Garner emerged on the scene with roles in “Dude’s Where’s My Car,” and “Felicity” and others.
As her career began to take off, she met fellow actor Ben Affleck on the set of “Pearl Harbor.
Their marriage brought an unprecedented level of paparazzi attention that disrupted their family’s daily life.
The former couple married in 2005, separated in 2015 and divorced in 2018. They share three children, daughters Violet Affleck, 20, Seraphina Affleck, 17 and son Samuel Affleck, 12.
Despite her life seemingly being blissful at that time, Garner recalled when the fame became overbearing even for her children.
In an interview on Evan Ross Katz’s “Shut Up Evan” podcast, Garner detailed exactly how fame disrupted her children’s lives.
Nearly halfway through the 49-minute episode, Katz mentioned that Garner spearheaded a 2013 fight for new paparazzi laws.
The “13 Going on 30” actress helped push California’s anti-paparazzi law to protect celebrity children from harassment by paparazzi. The next year, the California Assembly Judiciary Committee passed legislation to protect children.
Garner replied by offering some clarifications.
“Well credit where credit’s due, Halle Berry led that charge. She invited me and I worked my a— off on a speech,” she explained. “Ben helped me write it. OIur 5-year-old, at the time helped me write, we have a speech writer friend.”
“It was totally ludicrous,” Garner added.
She said it was a bit off-putting to complain, since her kids had “everything in the world.”
“But it was a danger to everyone around us,” she stressed. “If I went through a yellow light, 15 cars would go through the red behind me.”
She said the cars would go so far as to drive on people’s lawns and up hillsides.
The actress then blamed paparazzi for driving her away from her kids and upending her family life.
Adding context, she added, “We were trying to have our little one play soccer, and the association asked us to stop because there were 20 cars coming. So it wasn’t just about us. It was just an industry that had gotten out of control.”
Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner watching their kid's soccer match (10/May/2019) pic.twitter.com/mnJGrQW4fF
— ʙᴇꜱᴛ ᴏꜰ ʙᴇɴ ᴀꜰꜰʟᴇᴄᴋ (@BestAffleck) May 12, 2019
She argued no parent should struggle to reach a pediatrician because paparazzi blocked the way.
“And the kids are paying the price,” Garner continued. “Kids are getting knocked over coming out of preschool by photographers who are so hungry to get to me or to Ben trying to get to our kids.”
Garner showed gratitude for her luck and privilege in life but said it got silly with photographers.
Fans suggested that much of the attention Garner got was because of Affleck’s stardom.
Affleck’s career took off in the late ’90s after he co-wrote and starred in “Good Will Hunting.” He began taking lead roles in 1998 “Armageddon,” and again in the 2001 film “Pearl Harbor” which is the set where he met Garner.
One person who thought Affleck was the bigger star said, “She had a successful career, but still wouldn’t draw so much publicity if she hadn’t married Ben. She keeps herself linked with him. Without him, she wouldn’t get so many headlines.”
Someone else wrote, “Yet, she always inserts herself with anything going on with Ben. He draws the most publicity so maybe she should distance herself.”
Another person commented, “She’s not that’ famous’ as Ben is, she wish.”
“Wow that was disturbing,” read another person. Ironically enough, Garner said paparazzi followed her more than they did Ben sometimes when she had the children.
She said, “I lived on the street with a lot of much more famous and successful people than I, but they followed me because I had the kids. They wouldn’t follow Ben, they wouldn’t follow Matt Damon.”
Garner confessed that two photographers have been “assigned to me for 20 plus–25 years” when asked about paparazzi culture today.
She recalls repeatedly asking one photographer to leave and often calling police to keep him away.
Still, one frightening encounter changed everything. After a man she feared would hurt her began following her, Garner ran to that same photographer because she “trusted him.”
Garner said it was a Stockholm syndrome thing but also said that she and the photographer have a respect for each other.
When it comes to Garner and Affleck, usually when they are together someone photographs them. Whether they come together for the children’s birthday, school event, each other’s birthdays etc, paparazzi has captured it all.
Though the two are exes, they’ve maintained a good co-parenting and friendship, which has led some to believe they will give their love another shot.
