Kerry Washington called Viola Davis before she agreed to work with Ben Affleck on the Netflix film Animals, and Davis told her she was lucky, in an exchange Netflix posted on October 10, 2026.
Washington, who produces and stars in her own projects and has been doing both for two decades, described the call plainly. “I called Viola Davis,” she said. “I was like, Give me the skinny. How was it? How was your time on Air? Was he great? Was he terrible? How’d it go?” Davis, whom Affleck directed in Air, said nice things. Washington’s summary of the verdict was two words: “You’re lucky.”
Affleck did not know the call had happened until later. “I love when you told me later on you called around about me and checked up on me,” he said.
The second half of the exchange is the part to sit with. Animals has a sensual scene in it, and Washington walked Affleck through working with an intimacy coordinator. She described setting what she called “shared boundaries” and “shared rules” before anybody filmed anything, so that the work could be free inside them. “You’ve built the dance floor, and now you can dance on it,” she said.
He said the conversation changed how he saw her. “Whoa. I really have a lot that I can learn from this person,” he said.
Both halves are the same move. Before she took the job, she asked a woman who had already done it. Before the hardest day on the schedule, she set the terms out loud. Neither is a favor anybody did her. It is a method, and it is one Black women run on each other’s behalf constantly, in group chats and in phone calls that never make it onto a press tour.
The film is out now. Davis was the reference. Washington made the call. The person who came away saying he had something to learn was Affleck.
