The mother of Oscar-winning actors Ben and Casey Affleck has died.
Chris Affleck was 83 years old.
Chris Affleck was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in December, and according to her online obituary, she was given just six months to live.
Her family said she died in her sleep on June 2, two days after one of her grandchildren graduated from high school.
Chris Affleck was born Christopher Anne Boldt in New York City. Her family wrote, "From the beginning of her life, Chris made her unconventional name her own, foreshadowing both the personality and the practicality that would follow her to her death."
Chris Affleck was a civil rights advocate and was one of the original Freedom Riders in the 1960s. She taught literacy classes in Mississippi as part of Freedom Summer in 1964, her obituary said.
She graduated from Harvard University and was a public school teacher for 35 years before retiring in 2008.
Ben Affleck spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about his parents and their divorce.
“My mother taught public school, went to Harvard and then got her master’s there and taught fifth and sixth grade in a public school. My dad had a more working-class lifestyle. He didn’t go to college. He was an auto mechanic and a bartender and a janitor at Harvard,” he said.
They broke up when Ben Affleck was 12.
He said that his desire to be in the entertainment industry started when he was a teen and that his mother helped carve his path, connecting her oldest son with casting director Patty Collins, who was her former Harvard roommate, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
When Ben Affleck won an Oscar for “Good Will Hunting,” along with Matt Damon, after being nominated for Best Original Screenplay, Chris Affleck was at the ceremony with her son.
Her other son, Casey Affleck, is also an Oscar winner for his role in “Manchester by the Sea.”
Chris Affleck leaves behind her sons and five grandchildren.
©2026 Cox Media Group
