AFFLECK: And you did, which I thought was cool. You spent a lot of time with some of these girls from the real projects who showed you around and showed you their lives. You got into a whole world that I imagine is very different from Burbank-and probably very different from what you experienced on Traveling Pants. What was that like? Were you nervous? Were you excited?
LIVELY: For me this job was so great because it wasn't just about what I did onscreen-every day was a journey. It's interesting because as actors we're in a position where we can go and experience other peoples' lives a little bit-even if it's just a drop of what it is. So for me, personally, it was really amazing to experience something that's unlike anything I'd ever experienced. These girls were so kind to me. We just kind of hung out. They weren't excited about me being on Gossip Girl. They couldn't have cared less. They were actually kind of motherly-even though many of them were only 16 years old. They're hard as nails, but in a really wonderful, positive way. So we just hung out at their houses in the projects and they told me stories about their families and husbands and cousins who were bank robbers, and how this person ended up in jail and ratted on that person, and about the code of silence-which, for people who don't know, is a way certain criminals were able to avoid being arrested. There's this old-school idea of, it's not your problem, you stay out of it. These girls live in such a small world that there's a little bit of a time warp. It's contained in a lot of ways and the families are so close because they've lived together for generations. There's this really strong Irish blood there. It's like there's a sense of family with each other. Then, when I was talking to them about death . . . We were walking around one day and there was a baseball game going on in a park for this boy who was 16 and had just been murdered, and everybody was happy and celebrating him and wearing T-shirts with his name on them. I thought, "In my town, if something like this had happened, everybody would just be a disaster, and saying how tragic it is. People wouldn't be able to recover." But here it was more of a celebration of this boy's life. It wasn't that people weren't sad about it. They would just say, "It's something that happens and we need to be able to move on with life. We still have all these kids around us, and we still have to be parents and siblings for them." It was such an interesting thing for me to tap into, that mind-set.
AFFLECK: One of the girls you spent time with was the girlfriend of a guy who is in prison for armed robbery and who I based the main character on in a lot of ways. She told me that she was driving around in the car with you through the projects and she would see a friend of hers on the street and she would be like, "I got Hollywood in my car!"
LIVELY: [laughs] Oh, god. She was amazing. That's true.
AFFLECK: A lot of the people you based the character on came to the set to watch you work.
LIVELY: Well, you hired them as extras!
AFFLECK: But they approved of what you were doing-they liked it.
LIVELY: They liked it, but I was scared. I really didn't want to fail them. They would come in between takes and direct me. [laughs] They'd give me syllable readings.
AFFLECK: I know. I had to be like, "You know what guys? Thank you, but . . ."
LIVELY: They only did that a couple of times. They would come up and say, "You're doing great, but it's Chaahhlstown, not Charlestown."
AFFLECK: You know, before we did The Town, I wasn't superfamiliar with everything you'd done.
LIVELY: You weren't?
AFFLECK: Well, I was a fan of yours, but I didn't have the full, in-depth familiarity. But then I got to see The Private Lives of Pippa Lee on DVD, and I just thought all of the acting in that film was great. It was directed by Rebecca Miller, and she's super-heavy-duty. What was she like to work with?
LIVELY: Oh, gosh. She's such an incredible woman. She's one of the most interesting people I've ever met. The script was really wild. It was entirely hers, because she wrote the book that the film was based on, and she'd worked with the story for so many years. The movie is a woman's story, and it contains all these vignettes and interactions that she has experienced throughout her life, but it's told in such a different way. I said to Rebecca, "The script is great, but it's a little wild. How do you expect people to connect to something that's so out there at times?" And she said, "Most people's version of reality is two people sitting in a room, and it's bare, and they're sitting there, and it's simple and they're just having a conversation. But to me that's not reality at all. When I'm sitting in a room, talking, there are all of these things going on in my head. There are all these thoughts and emotions and bubbles and colors." She said, "This isn't a story about anybody except for this one woman, and that's what's happening in her mind. To me, that's reality."
AFFLECK: See, if I were a real director, I would have said something informed and brilliant like that. I was just like, "I don't know. Come on, let's shoot." So I was basically right to feel insecure.
LIVELY: [laughs] I don't know if you should have felt insecure, but I would call Rebecca between scenes on our film and say, "Ben's telling me to do this thing, but he's so wrong."
AFFLECK: I remember one scene we shot that was really important. It was a scene with you and Jon Hamm in this bar. It meant a lot to me-I had really been anticipating it. You had the Pippa Lee premiere that night and you really wanted to be there. It was important to you. So you said to me, "Listen, I would like to be able to go to this thing. Do you think we'll get done in time?" And I said, "Yeah, we're going to be able to get you out. The scene is only going to take six hours to shoot." We got to the middle of the six hours and we hadn't even gotten your coverage done-it was clear that you weren't going to make it. But instead of complaining or being upset, you stayed, and were there, committed to getting the scene right. I thought that revealed a lot about who you are as an actress and the kind of focus and attention you have. I think there's a tension in those choices between the work that you have to do, and the things that will make that work better-in my experience anyway. And as you get more successful, the tension only gets greater as you're pulled in all of these different directions. How do you anticipate navigating that tension?
LIVELY: I love what I do. I love my work. So, you know, of course I wanted to be at the premiere, but I had a job to do, and so I had to be on the set in Boston and be a part of it. At the end of the day, a premiere is a premiere. It's not somebody living or dying. So for me, this other stuff-well, the perks-is not the reason I do the job. Couture fashion week, getting to meet Karl Lagerfeld and John Galliano and Christian Louboutin is so exciting. It's like being a little girl and looking at these designers saying, "Can you imagine one day seeing all of those ball gowns?" But at the end of the day I wouldn't be there without my job. There are a few things in life that matter above all else: your family, your friends, your loved ones. But everything else comes and goes-especially in this business where everything is so of the moment.
AFFLECK: Is there anyone whose career you admire?
LIVELY: People always ask me that and I always answer with men. Which is not to say that there aren't incredible women in this business, but I feel like men are still given much better opportunities. I feel like there are so many people I admire for so many reasons that I can't look at one person's life and say, "I want that life." I want to make my own history.
AFFLECK: I always have to remind myself how young you are. You were 3 when Good Will Hunting [1997] came out.
LIVELY: [laughs] Not quite.
AFFLECK: And you've never even seen it. That felt good to me.
LIVELY: You were in Good Will Hunting?
AFFLECK: But you have your head on pretty straight. You and I had to do a sex scene on the first day of shooting, and you were very poised and comfortable about it-more mature than some of the crew members.
LIVELY: Well, I have a big family and no one ever treated me like a child. They always treated me like an adult, like an equal. But with acting, I think half of it is just acting confident. We stand on these red carpets and pose in these dresses, but we're all only so confident. It doesn't mean we think we're great looking or anything. It's all a façade. But the sex scene was really awkward. It was my first day, so thank you for that.
AFFLECK: You're welcome.
LIVELY: I guess it was good to break the ice. [laughs]
AFFLECK: So before you got to Paris, you were down in New Orleans doing Green Lantern, which is a big Hollywood superhero movie. You're playing the secretary of the Air Force or something?
LIVELY: Secretary? I own the company! I play a fighter pilot. Are you intimidated now?
AFFLECK: So you're playing a much older character-a person with a lot of responsibility in regards to airplanes and that kind of stuff.
LIVELY: Did you see Pearl Harbor [2001]? My character has the same kind of position as the lead character in that.
AFFLECK: [laughs] Funnily enough, that doesn't bring anything to mind. I must have blacked that out. So who's more attractive: Jon Hamm or Ryan Reynolds?
LIVELY: Pete Postlethwaite.
AFFLECK: See, that's the quote that's going to get pulled out and be in bold letters above the interview. So when people read it, they get to this part of the conversation and they say, "Well, that was just bull****." [Lively laughs] I do have to say though, Pete Postlethwaite is an attractive guy. He is fabulous. And Green Lantern sounds pretty good.
LIVELY: Oh, my gosh. Martin Campbell, our director, has been incredible. He's one of the hardest-working people I've ever met. He spent a lot of time working with us, trying to create the main story line between these two people so there is something you can connect with in the middle of everything else. This is sounding not so interesting anymore, the way I'm talking about it . . . Things blow up.
AFFLECK: So how old are you really?
LIVELY: I'm 23.
AFFLECK: You're 23. When you look at the future and the choices you're going to make, do you think at all about how you want to approach them?
LIVELY: I look at anything in life like as long as you do what you believe in, then it's going to work out. Because even if other people don't like what you're doing, you're happy because you did what you believed in.
AFFLECK: Well, that was the last question. I didn't get to some others I wanted to ask you, like, "Which day did you find yourself most impressed by me?"
LIVELY: Or am I happy that you don't wear cashmere turtlenecks anymore.
AFFLECK: Oh, Jesus Christ. I don't know what pictures you're looking at. How about: Would you work with me again? When your price is too expensive, can I hire you for scale? I want you to say it now so it's in a magazine.
LIVELY: Oh, gosh. You're so tacky! I told you already that I'd never work with you again. Jason Bourne maybe.
AFFLECK: Do you remember when you and I had worked together for months and we were wandering around in Boston and at one point I just randomly pointed to a place and said, "Matt Damon lived there." And you turned to me and were like, "What? You know Jason Bourne?" [Lively laughs]
LIVELY: Of course I'll work with you again.
AFFLECK: I'm going to introduce you to Jason Bourne so that you'll be grateful.
LIVELY: I'm already grateful.
AFFLECK: Now stop trolling the Internet looking for pictures of me and critiquing my wardrobe. Before I went to do this interview somebody said, "Blake is a fashion darling." All of us can't be fashion darlings, Blake.
LIVELY: Well, people like you make me fashionable, because if there is no wrong there can be no right.
AFFLECK: You've gotten so much more bitchy since we wrapped the film.
LIVELY: But I think you have to say that I'm charming at the end of the interview. I think that's the rule.
AFFLECK: You're very charming.
LIVELY: Actually, I think they usually like to end these interviews on a funny note.
AFFLECK: I'm not sure that I said anything funny. Maybe you did.
LIVELY: Maybe they'll just have someone else redo the interview.
AFFLECK: Okay, then. I'm going to let you go. I can hear the Gossip Girl people banging on your trailer door because you're holding up the whole production doing this interview. This is how you get a bad reputation: You stay on the phone doing interviews.
LIVELY: I'm actually not in a trailer. I'm in a hotel room with no air conditioning. It's very special.
AFFLECK: That's the charm of Europe. What can I say?
LIVELY: That's going to be the quote right there: "Ben Affleck says things don't work well in Europe."
