Jennifer Garner Opens Up on Emotional New Role in Upcoming “The Tribes of Palos Verdes”

Jennifer Garner’s role in her new film, The Tribes of Palos Verdes, was very close to heart.

Garner, who also served as the film’s executive producer, plays a woman betrayed by her husband. Having no trouble filling her role as executive producer, she told ET at the Hamptons International Film Festival on Friday that portraying a single mom was “its own bear to get through.”

The actress who filed for divorce from her husband Ben Affleck in April spoke of what it was like to play an on-screen character who goes through a break-up, like she went through off-screen.

“Anytime that you’re playing someone who is going through something, you have to just figure it out, and you actually – believe it or  not – don’t use your own life as much as you might think,” said the actress.”You just get into that place. That’s your job, and then you shake it off, because you have to go home and raise your kids,” she explained. “It’s just like any other time I do a scene with an emotional place.”

While the 45-year-old actress played down the effort it took to film emotional scenes like the one where her character finds out her husband is cheating on her, director Emmett Malloy told ET that during that scene in particular she really “went for it.”

The Tribes of Palos Verdes opens in select theaters on December 1.