He's undoubtedly one of the biggest actors of our time, with a name that's known the world over. But when we recently sat down with Matt Damon in London, we learnt just how refreshingly down to earth he is – even after this long in the A-list spotlight.
Damon is now back on the big screen in Jason Bourne, his fourth outing as the former CIA assassin, in which he finally remembers who he truly is.
So BuzzFeed decided to sit down with him and find out a little bit more about the person behind the character. Here's what went down.
1. What's your favourite pizza topping?
Matt Damon: When I was a broke, well, semi-broke actor I think my favourite Domino's pizza order, I would get pepperoni and green pepper...and maybe onion.
2. What’s your spirit animal?
MD: My what?
BuzzFeed: Your spirit animal.
MD: My spirit animal? [bursts out laughing] Actually, so I just did this movie where there's a scene where I'm playing bongo drums and one of the stand-ons working on the movie came up and told me I might find my spirit animal while I was [filming]. So it's very funny that you say that! I don't know what my spirit animal is. I did play the bongo drums and I did about three takes and nothing came to me, but I was probably only banging on the drums for about five minutes in total. [jokes] So I think you've got to do it for a couple of hours.
3. If you could be any animal what would you be, then?
MD: [thinks very, very, very hard] I guess...a loyal dog in a good household.
4. Favourite drunk food?
MD: When I was at college I would find myself eating Cheez Doodles. I would go to the 7-Eleven and get, you know, the puffy kind.
5. What’s your weirdest possession?
MD: [thinks] I don't know. Sharlto [Copley, the actor], who I did Elysium with, gave me a spaceship from Elysium made out of beer cans. And so I have that in my office. That's probably the oddest thing that I have.
6. What was the last thing you cried at?
MD: I cry so easily. I watched...you ever see "Carpool Karaoke", the James Corden thing?
BF: Of course!
MD: Did you see the Stevie Wonder one? It's EPIC. You have to go on YouTube and watch it. I cried when Stevie Wonder calls James Corden's wife and he starts crying and that made me tear up.
Here it is if you haven't seen it or want to cry again!
View this video on YouTube
7. If you could forget one thing like Bourne does, what would it be?
MD: [thinks] Press junkets would be high up there. [laughs]
BF: [nods] Fair.
8. What superhero would you be if you could be any?
9. What advice would you give to your 16-year-old self?
MD: I don't know, you know. Everybody told me not to be an actor and I was going to do it no matter what. And so when people ask me now, like, I don't think what I would say to my 16-year-old self. But when other 16-year-olds and people come up to me and say, "I want to be an actor" I always tell them not to be. Because if I can convince them not to be then they shouldn't be. Because it requires such...I mean you get kicked in the teeth quite a bit when you start out, and you need to have a lot of resolve, an inordinate amount of resolve to pull it off. And so if you can be convinced in one conversation not to do it, then you really shouldn't do it.
10. Kittens or puppies?
11. Do you have a secret talent? What is it?
MD: Erm, I don't think I have a secret talent. I think being an actor you end up being a jack of all trades, master of none. You know, you learn a lot of weird things. For instance, in the second Bourne movie there's a whole scene underwater where the car goes off into a river and we had to do this whole scene in a tank, but inside a car under the water. I didn't get certified to scuba dive. So I spent a hundred hours underwater practising, doing small tasks with my air taken away. So...bizarre talents that wouldn't translate into anything for regular life.
12. What’s your first memory ever?
MD: I think I remember my house, the nursery, and the mobile in my crib. And I remember...I must have been put down for naps there every day but I do remember that room and that kind of bluish light when I think about it. It probably would have been in the afternoon and I think that's my earliest memory.
13. What would you be if you weren’t an actor?
MD: A writer. I'd work in film if I could, yeah. In some way.
14. Biggest pet peeve?
MD: I don't have one thing that drives me crazy that I can think of. Sorry. [gives BuzzFeed a big grin then laughs] Am I doing a horrible job of these questions?!
15. Ambition you have left?
MD: Well, I'd love to direct. I just love making movies so I want to keep doing that. But directing is really where all of the responsibility really lies...it's the toughest job without a doubt, so I'd love to try that.
16. On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the highest, how annoying is the "Maaaatt Damon" Team America reference?
MD: I don't know, it's kind of gotten to a... it never really annoyed me. And now it's kind of comforting when I walk down the street and people [say it] [laughs]. In fact, you know the professional autograph people who come with pictures of movies? I signed more of that puppet than I have [of me].
MD: And they always want me to do like 10 A's. So Maaaaatt Daaamon [pretends to write it down]. And I don't mind. And those dudes are geniuses, they're, like, honest-to-god comic geniuses, Trey [Parker] and Matt [Stone].
MD: And I will also say that all of the actors who were parodied in that movie were parodied for being against the Iraq war. And so history's on my side, not theirs.
17. What’s the wallpaper on your phone?
MD: I don't right now – on this phone I don't have a screensaver. It's tough because I have four kids so I can't put one of them on, right, and then I've got to have a picture of all four of them, which is always hard to do. So I don't actually have a screensaver right now.
18. Will you ever join social media so you can get Ben Affleck back with things like this?
If you could go back in time, what advice would you give this guy? #AskBourne
MD: Dude, that hair, do you know what I realised? Because I've not seen that picture since, I mean it's my high school yearbook picture, so that haircut is 1987 or '88 or something, I literally had that exact wig in Behind the Candelabra. It's kind of amazing. And look, how could that guy be anything but a successful movie star? [bursts out laughing]
MD: [As for Twitter], maybe, I don't know. Twitter seems like a great way to keep in touch. I just never believe that my first response to anything is the one I want to go on record with, you know. [laughs] I'd rather reflect a little bit.
