Ben Affleck has broken his silence after the deaths of his parents, mom Chris and dad Timothy.
“My parents just died, both of them, in April and in June,” Ben, 54, said on the Wednesday, September 30, episode of the “Streets We Grew Up On” podcast. “It’s sort of a big thing, and it’s caused me to start thinking about my own childhood in ways that has been a little bit different. I’ve certainly learned to even more deeply appreciate my mom and really value and see what she did and what the the sacrifice and commitment that she made and how complete it was.”
Ben and his brother, Casey Affleck, were primarily raised by by Chris following their parents’ divorce.
News broke on July 24 that Chris had died weeks earlier on June 2, with The Hollywood Reporter noting she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in December 2025. An obituary published by the Boston Globe revealed that Chris was “given five months to live” after her diagnosis. She was 83.
Earlier this month, Casey, 51, revealed that the siblings also lost their father. While speaking at the 2026 Venice International Film Festival, the actor dedicated his movie Company to his late parents.
“They were very important to me,” he said at the time. “I really wanted to show this movie to them and I didn’t get to. I think they would have liked it.”
Chris and Timothy are survived by their two sons and five grandchildren. (Ben shares three children with ex-wife Jennifer Garner, while Casey is the father of two sons with ex-wife Summer Phoenix.)
Ben and Casey often had their mom’s support throughout their respective Hollywood careers. Chris famously attended the 1998 Oscars with Ben in celebration of Good Will Hunting. (Ben and frequent collaborator Matt Damon earned nine nominations, ultimately winning Best Original Screenplay.)
“We were sitting next to our moms and we won, and we kind of hugged our moms. I remember how everyone had made such a big thing out of it as if this was such a novelty,” Ben recalled to Vanity Fair in April 2023. “I remember thinking, being insecure, like, ‘Why? Why is it weird that we’re bringing our moms?’ Who else do you think we would bring?”
Just like Ben, Casey had been overwhelmingly grateful for Chris’ tireless support.
“We were usually extras [on set]. My mother was really supportive,” Casey told Boston Magazine in 2006 of his early career. “We didn’t really care that much about it other than it was a day off from school and 20 bucks.”
At the time, Casey also praised Chris’ role as a single parent.
“She’s very conscientious. She made us stay inside when Skylab was falling,” Casey recalled, referring to the 1979 crash of America’s first space station. “And she always made us go on family vacations. When you’re a kid, you just want to stay home and hang out with your friends. You don’t want to go to your grandparents’ house, but tradition meant a lot to her. She just insisted. We had a lot of fights about that, but now I love it and those are some of my favorite memories.”
