“Yeah, what the f---? That guy was really good,” Damon recalls of his first impression of Pascal on set of “The Adjustment Bureau.”

Matt Damon knew Pedro Pascal would be a star even though his bit part was cut

"Yeah, what the f---? That guy was really good," Damon recalls of his first impression of Pascal on set of "The Adjustment Bureau."

By Lauren Huff

Lauren Huff

Lauren Huff is an award-winning journalist and staff writer at ** with over 12 years of experience covering all facets of the entertainment industry.

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January 19, 2026 7:00 p.m. ET

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Matt Damon in 2024; Pedro Pascal in 2025. Credit:

Bruce Glikas/WireImage; Julien Hekimian/Getty

Pedro Pascal is so good that even when he has nothing to do in a role, he makes an impression. Just ask Matt Damon.

Damon recalled recently on *The Howard Stern Show *his first impression of Pascal on the set of the 2011 sci-romance, *The Adjustment Bureau*.

"I’ve done cameos and things, and it’s a very, very, very difficult thing to do," Damon said of being a day player on films during a joint appearance with Ben Affleck on Stern's SiriusXM show. "In fact, this is really interesting... I did a movie with Emily Blunt called *The Adjustment Bureau*, and we were shooting a scene in New York, and we came in, and there was this throwaway part of a maitre’d who sat us, and it got cut out of the movie."

He continued, "But I remember Emily and I went and sat down and this maitre’d walked way, and they cut, and we both looked at each other, and Em goes, ‘That guy’s really f---ing good.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, what the f---? That guy was really good. There was something just incredibly interesting, but real and natural…' And years later, I found out it was Pedro Pascal. Not even a day player with anything actually really to do. Just his presence, we both recognized it immediately. And it was Pedro."

In the film, which is loosely based on Philip K. Dick's 1954 short story "Adjustment Team," Damon plays David Norris, an ambitious young congressman who finds himself falling in love with Blunt's ballerina character, but mysterious forces work to keep them apart.

Matt Damon and Emily Blunt in 'The Adjustment Bureau'.

Andrew Schwartz/Universal

The memory of Pascal was spurred on when Stern brought up how Damon himself only had one line in the 1988 rom-com *Mystic Pizza*, a bit part that he beat Affleck for.

"When you got that one line in *Mystic Pizza*, when you’re sitting at that dinner table, is it harder in a sense to deliver one line rather than a monologue," Stern asked Damon. "You were a young guy, you wanted to impress all these actors sitting at the table. And they give you one line. It’s a line. And it’s your big moment... Is it a horrible experience to have one line?"

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"No," Damon told him. "I remember that as being... It was three nights of shooting, because it was a big dinner table scene, and there was a lot of coverage, and I just remember being so excited, feeling like *I can’t believe that I’m here*. All the lights, the crew, the whole thing felt like... I knew I was where I wanted to be. I loved everything about it."

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Damon and Affleck appeared on *Stern* to promote their new Netflix movie *The Rip*,

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