Ben Affleck talks marriage, 'Gone' role relating to fame

NEW YORK — If there's one thing Ben Affleck knows for sure, it's that you can't meander through life. You get out of it what you put into it, and everything — marriage, career, parenthood — takes work.

It's why, when accepting his best picture Oscar for Argo last February, he praised Jennifer Garner, his wife of nine years and mother of their three children, not with a treacly sentiment, but with the kind of direct assessment he himself appreciates.

"If you care about a relationship, you need to put work into it. My wife is very committed to that and I wanted to thank her for that. That's more meaningful to me. I wanted to be really honest. That's really laudable," he says.

And it's why, after a decade-long career resurgence that saw him venture into directing three acclaimed films and scoring an Academy Award, he made a U-turn right back to his roots, as a leading man. This time, as Nick Dunne, in David Fincher's darkly moody drama Gone Girl, opening Friday. Without giving away any spoilers, Affleck's Dunne stands accused of murdering his wife (Rosamund Pike), who is, simply, gone, as the title suggests. In the role, Affleck is both highly alluring in his everyman way and utterly inscrutable.

"On the one hand, Ben is so easy to know because he's so charismatic and charming. I don't mean that in a glib way," says Pike. "On the other hand, I feel that I don't know him at all. I have no idea who he is at home. Sure, he must have insecurities we all have. I have not seen his. He's a pro."

Dunne is flayed by the media, and pursued by the cops, all the while acting as his own worst enemy with unfortunate smirks and misguided decisions. Yes, Affleck can relate to have an unwanted spotlight blinding him.

"I've never been accused of murdering anybody. But really, there's a relationship between tabloid celebrity fame and what happens to Nick, it's sort of parallel," says Affleck, who endured his share of scrutiny early in his career for a series of high-profile relationships and professional missteps.

"Judgments get made about you. You don't recognize the caricature of yourself that's being projected. I care what the people I like and respect say (about me). The broader stuff is not meaningful to me. It's not proved to be relevant. If I listened to what people said, I would have never started directing and my life would be a lot less interesting."