Jennifer Garner paid tribute to pal and 13 Going on 30 costar Mark Ruffalo.
While Ruffalo, 56, was being honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, he and Garner, 51, did part of their iconic “Thriller” dance from the 2004 film. Garner then took the stage and gave a sweet shoutout to her former costar.
“How lucky are we to have been in a movie that kids are still dressing up as for Halloween?” Garner said on Thursday, February 8. “I wonder if my colleagues Reese Witherspoon, Jennifer Aniston, Gwyneth [Paltrow], Keira Knightley — I wonder if they would agree that Mark owes this rom-com success to the scruffy hair, the untucked, cute button down, both of which became the norm for cute guys everywhere for the next 20 years.”
Ruffalo starred alongside Witherspoon, Aniston, Paltrow and Knightley in the films Just Like Heaven, Rumor Has It, Thanks for Sharing and Begin Again, respectively.
“I wonder if these esteemed ladies enjoyed Mark’s anxiety as much as I did? I wonder if he tried to drop out of their films like he did out of ours after the first rehearsal of the ‘Thriller’ dance, where Mark went from kind of shocked that we actually had to do this to antsy to a deathly quiet to ‘Bro, this is not for me,’” Garner continued in her speech.
Garner added, “To work with you, Mark, is to love you, I don’t care what anyone says.”
In 13 Going on 30, teenager Jenna Rink wishes to become “30, flirty and thriving” and wakes up as an adult, portrayed by Garner, in 2004. Ruffalo played her childhood friend turned love interest, Matt “Matty” Flamhaff.
“You allow yourself to be fully known by your colleagues, by the audience, by the world,” Garner continued. “Your work on Poor Things deserves all of the awards, all of them. But the real success is in how thrilled and delighted your colleagues are to have the opportunity to lift you up and celebrate you. Every time your name is called, Hollywood takes a deep collective breath and says, OK, the good and right thing has happened.’”
Ruffalo is currently nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Academy Awards ceremony for his role in Poor Things. This marks Ruffalo’s fourth Best Supporting Actor nomination throughout his career.
In the 2023 film, Ruffalo starred opposite Emma Stone, who replaced her character’s brain with that of an infant’s. As Stone’s character regains her intelligence, she runs off with Ruffalo’s character.
