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Ben Affleck has explained why he left the DC Extended Universe and chose to hand over his role as the Batman to Robert Pattinson.
The actor had played the Caped Crusader in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League, and also had a cameo in Suicide Squad.
In an interview with the New York Times, Affleck spoke of his decision to exit the project following his divorce from Jennifer Garner. “I showed somebody The Batman script,” Affleck said. “They said, ‘I think the script is good. I also think you’ll drink yourself to death if you go through what you just went though again.”
Affleck then spoke of his “troubled shoot” on Justice League and detailed his relationship with alcohol following his separation.
“I drank relatively normally for a long time. What happened was that I started drinking more and more when my marriage was falling apart,” he said.
“You’re trying to make yourself feel better with eating or drinking or sex or gambling or shopping or whatever,” Affleck continued. “But that ends up making your life worse. Then you do more of it to make that discomfort go away. Then the real pain starts. It becomes a vicious cycle you can’t break. That’s at least what happened to me.”
Matt Reeves’ The Batman has since cast Robert Pattinson in the lead role, opposite Zoë Kravitz as Catwoman, Paul Dano as Riddler, John Turturro as Falcone, Andy Serkis as Pennyworth, Colin Farrell as Penguin.
Ben Affleck will next be starring in Dee Rees’ The Last Thing He Wanted, and The Way Back, directed by Jack Cunningham.
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