Ben Affleck, 46, still loves his ex-wife Jennifer Garner. That’s what the Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice star said about the actress on Today on March 4. The dad-of-three – who was on the morning show to promote his new Netflix movie Triple Frontier – happily admitted that he still has love for his former wife of 13 years, who is also 46.
The revelation came shortly after Ben gushed about Jennifer dressing up as How To Train Your Dragon’s Astrid for their son Samuel’s seventh birthday. The actress shared an Instagram picture of her wearing the costume on Feb. 28. She admitted that their son was not impressed and even rolled his eyes at her effort. Speaking to Today show anchor Hoda Kotb on March 4, Ben joked about Jennifer’s dress-up fail by saying, “She wanted to jump in on the whole costume phase, mania thing…” But, he added, “My son definitely killed it.”
After he finished his story, Hoda said, “You can tell you still love her, when you just talked about her.” Ben didn’t miss a beat and replied, “Of course, she’s wonderful. Somebody’s the mother of your kids, they’re going to be the most important, central person in your life, and that’s good.”
Ben, who was on Today with his Triple Frontier co-star Charlie Hunnam, also talked about fatherhood and how much it means to him. “I hope I’m a pretty good dad. I certainly try very hard,” he said. “I’m lucky they’ve got a great mom, and she helps out a great deal with making sure that we co-parent in as good a way as possible.”
Ben and Jennifer have three children together – Violet, 13, Seraphina, 10, and Samuel, who just turned 7. He added, “Dads are so important to kids and it’s our responsibility to be there for them, to be present, to be mindful, to be attentive, to be part of their lives…to be as in it as moms. That’s really the central preoccupation of my life. The focus of my life. It’s what I love doing. It’s what makes me happy and the rest of the stuff kind of follows.”
Ben also didn’t shy away from talking about his addiction to alcohol. In August 2018 the Oscar-winning actress entered rehab and left after 40 days. He spoke openly about his treatment on his social media pages on Oct. 4 saying, in part, “Battling any addiction is a lifelong and difficult struggle.” Ben told Hoda during his Today appearance, “It doesn’t really bother me to talk about alcoholism and being an alcoholic. It’s part of my life. It’s something that I deal with. It doesn’t have to sort of subsume my whole identity and be everything, but it is something that you know you have to work at. I feel like I had a problem and I really want to address it and I take some pride in that.”