Director Gavin O'Connor Says the Ben Affleck Film THE WAY BACK Was Saved by Jennifer Garner

The inspiring underdog basketball story The Way Back hit theaters this weekend. The movie stars Ben Affleck as Jack Cunningham, a former high school basketball star who gave up his chance at a future in the game, only to be offered a coaching position at his alma mater in hopes of bringing the struggling team to glory. This looks like a great movie. But it almost didn’t get made.

They were getting the film off the ground during the period of time that Affleck went to rehab for his alcohol addiction. The film’s director, Gavin O’Connor (Miracle, The Accountant), who co-wrote the film with Brad Ingelsby (Out of the Furnace), didn’t know if the film was destined to move on, as schedules would have to be reworked, and it was unknown if Affleck would be returning to make the movie. But it did go on to be made, and O’Connor says that is thanks to Affleck’s ex-wife, actress Jennifer Garner.

O’Connor told 34th Street:

“So, what happened was, just as we started prepping the movie, Ben fell off the wagon. So he ended up going to rehab, and I didn’t know if the movie was over. The studio certainly thought the movie was over. His ex-wife Jennifer Garner called me up, and told me that when he went to rehab, he took a basketball with him. She said, ‘Gavin, he’s asking you, please don’t pull the plug on the movie, he really wants to do this.’”

He went on to explain that he met up with Affleck after a week in detox and decided the next steps for the film:

We spent half a day together and figured out a way to do this that will work for him, because most importantly he needed to recover and needed to get his sobriety on track. That overtook everything. And then he got out the day before we started shooting. So we had a very raw, vulnerable guy showing up for our first day of shooting.

He also talked about the fact that the character Affleck portrayed was a recovering alcoholic, and that it was a very raw and real portrayal that was difficult to see Ben have to do. But it made for a beautiful performance. He said:

It's almost a counter–intuitive thing with acting, because he's doing scenes that were obviously painful. Really intense and dark and bleak and suffering. And capturing that, to watch him do that was hard at times, but it also was euphoric, because that's your job as an actor, is to access these emotions and to go to places that are honest and deep and truthful. So, it always felt really good, even though it was painful, because he was doing his job really well.

This sounds like it was a tricky film for someone in recovery to take on. But maybe because he was in the midst of treatment, and had the tools at his disposal, it was safer than if he wasn’t in that place. I’m just glad Affleck got the help he needed, and I hope he is able to continue to take care of himself.

The Way Back is in theaters everywhere. Have you seen the film yet?