American actor, the author of a movie script that he and his buddy, actor Ben Affleck, wrote for themselves, called “Good Will Hunting.” They sold the script to Miramax for over $1 million, and played the key roles themselves.
The son of a realtor dad and a college professor mom, Damon grew up in Boston. He left Harvard a year short of graduation in favor of an acting career.
The film, “Courage Under Fire,” gave him a start and he played an attorney in “The Rainmaker,” 1997. His role in “Hunting” showed why he became Hollywood’s Young Man of the Moment. Minnie Driver played his onscreen romance, a role that they continued off-screen until he hit a new low by announcing on a 1/12/1998 interview that he was a “single man.” Driver said that it was the first she knew that they were no longer a couple.
At the Academy Awards of 3/23/1998, Damon was a nominee for Best Actor, and winner of an Award for Best Original Screenplay. After breaking up with Minnie Driver, he began seeing Winona Ryder in 1998 in between a stream of film commitments and an salary that escalated to $5 million a picture. He suffered a financial setback in 2000 through his investments with Dana Giacchetto which proved bogus, defrauded out of a reported $100,000.
In September 2005, Damon’s representative confirmed that the actor is engaged to Luciana Barroso (aka Luciana Bozan), an interior designer whom he has been dating since 2003. They married in a private ceremony in New York City on December 9, 2005.
The couple has three daughters: Isabella (b. June 2006), Gia Zavala (b. August 2008), and Stella Zavala (b. October 2010). He also has a stepdaughter, Alexia Barroso (b. 1998), from Luciana’s previous marriage.
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