Minnie Driver explains her ‘devastated’ reaction to Matt Damon’s Oscar win

Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter for all the latest entertainment news and reviews Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy Minnie Driver has revealed why she looked “devastated” while watching Matt Damon and Ben Affleck pick up the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for Good Will Hunting in 1998. Footage of Affleck and Damon’s acceptance speech from that year’s Academy Awards was recently posted by the popular Movie Shmood Instagram account, leading one user to comment: “Minnie looks so sad.” Driver replied directly to the comment, explaining: “Matt had ended our relationship a few weeks before this, and was at the Oscars with his new … I was devastated.” She added: “Wish I could have celebrated more as it was an amazing moment for all of us, and for this wonderful film”. Matt Damon and Minnie Driver at the premiere of ‘Good Will Hunting’ in 1997 Prior to the Academy Awards, Damon had publicly announced his break-up from Driver during an appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Plan auto-renews until cancelled Try for free In a 1998 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Driver said: “It’s unfortunate that Matt went on Oprah; it seemed like a good forum for him to announce to the world that we were no longer together, which I found fantastically inappropriate.” She added: “Of course, he was busy declaring his love for me on David Letterman a month previously.” Last year, Driver said that while she and Damon are “not friends”, she still has “an enormous amount of love” for him.