Bianca Wooden
Some parents say the teen years are the hardest, but TV and real life mom Jennifer Garner cherishes her relationship with her teen daughters.
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The 13 Going on 30 actress recently spoke to People at the premiere of her new show, The Last Thing He Told Me. In the series, based on a novel by the same title, Garner plays a stepmom who must work together with her teenage stepdaughter to solve the mystery of her missing husband.
“I just have a huge heart for teenagers,” said the celeb, “I love them. I love what they’re going through. I see how hard it is to be a teen right now.”
Garner Stars as Stepmom in Adaptation of Laura Dave Novel
Jennifer Garner has two daughters, 17-year-old Violet Ann and 14-year-old Seraphina Rose, whom she shares with actor and ex-husband Ben Affleck. The divorced couple also has a son, 11. On raising teenagers, the Peppermint star said that it was important to keep an open mind.
“I mean, I’m learning as much from them, or more from them, than they’ll ever learn from me,” she said.
Garner’s relationship with her real life kids couldn’t be more different than the troubled bond between her character, Hannah, and her character’s stepdaughter in The Last Thing He Told Me.
“The teenager in the story, Bailey, played by the beautiful Angourie Rice, she’s a whole other… she’s mean,” the actress said. “My kids aren’t mean — they’re teenagers, but they’re not mean. Not to me.”
Jennifer Garner and her daughter, Seraphina, actually bonded over reading the Laura Dave novel that the series is based on. However, it’s unlikely that they will watch the series together, since the star has reported that her kids don’t like watching her on television.
“They don’t love seeing me play someone else’s mom, honestly,” she said.
