What's love without heartbreak? Although Minnie Driver felt devastated attending the 1998 Academy Awards, she can look back on her relationship with Matt Damon in a new light. Driver says Damon broke her heart, but she grew from that heartbreak.
Appearing on The Jennifer Hudson Show (via Fox News), Driver reflected on the very public moment in which she appeared upset at the Oscars. Driver was up for Best Supporting Actress for Good Will Hunting that year. However, she looked anything but happy.
"We'd recently broken up. I was nominated, he was nominated, the movie was so amazing. He had a new girlfriend. I was totally heartbroken, but I think anyone who's been heartbroken can understand, it's like the last thing you want is everybody having a window in on that and it was so public," Driver explained.
She continued: "The reaction when they won, and they cut to me because there was a camera right in the face of the poor young 25-year-old girl, who's about to burst into tears."
Minnie Driver Wishes She Could Hug Past Self
Responding to an Instagram video from the moment, Driver explained that Damon pulled the plug on their relationship just a few weeks prior. He ended up going to the Oscars with his new girlfriend, which upset Driver. Driver and Damon ironically met on the set of Good Will Hunting, dating for about a year.
"Matt had ended our relationship a few weeks before this, and was at the Oscars with his new gf," she explained. "I was devastated. Wish I could have celebrated more as it was an amazing moment for all of us, and for this wonderful film!"
Driver wished that she could go back in time and tell her past self that everything was going to be alright. She said, " I want to wrap [her] arms around that young woman and hug her."
After her relationship with Damon, Driver went on to date Josh Brolin and Timothy J. Lea. She's currently dating Addison O'Dea.
"From this vantage point, you know, 20/20 vision much later in my life," she said. "I wish I could have told her, 'Honey, it's cool. Like you can celebrate and life's going to be great and beautiful and hard and amazing, and you're going to love again. It'll be fine.'"
Driver doesn't have any regrets on how her relationship ended with Damon.
"I tell [the story of our relationship] with love, because that was just a sweet romance that was just a sweet love affair in the center of all of that stuff, but had a combustible ending, which then became the focus," Driver said. "Another thing that my parents taught me, was there just isn't any time to sit around feeling resentful or angry, just have to get on and everybody had a beautiful life."
