Matt Damon Nearly Starred in ‘Ted’ but ‘I Talked Myself Out of It’: ‘I Don’t Know What I Was Thinking’

Nov 5, 2026 1:54pm PT Matt Damon Nearly Starred in ‘Ted’ but ‘I Talked Myself Out of It’: ‘I Don’t Know What I Was Thinking’

By Isabelle Farina

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Isabelle Farina

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Matt Damon still can’t get “Ted” out of his head.

Damon confirmed he passed on starring in the 2012 comedy as the foul-mouthed teddy bear’s best friend, John, who was later played by Mark Wahlberg

“I don’t want to live with the regret, but I can tell you that I passed on ‘Ted’ and I’ve never had this experience where I laughed so hard reading a script,” Damon said in an interview with GQ. “I literally took it to dinner and was reading parts of it out to my friends at dinner. And then I just got too clever by half. I don’t know what I was thinking. I was like, ‘Well, maybe the teddy bear’s actually the best part.’”

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