Braintree gets its close-up in 'The Tender Bar,' starring Ben Affleck

Braintree gets its Hollywood close-up … playing a small North Carolina town.

Standing in for Rockingham, N.C., Braintree provides the backdrop for the climactic moment in “The Tender Bar,” the coming-of-age-drama directed by George Clooney and starring Cambridge’s Ben Affleck and Tye Sheridan.

The movie opened in theaters, though not on the South Shore, Dec. 17, and will stream beginning Jan. 7 on Amazon Prime. Affleck stars as a literature-savvy bartender who is a father figure to his nephew, JR, played as a child by newcomer Daniel Ranieri and as an adult by Sheridan (“Ready Player One”). 

The story spans 15 years, starting in 1973, when JR, a precocious 9-year-old, and his single mom (Lily Rabe, “The Undoing”) reluctantly move back into her childhood home with her father (Christopher Lloyd) and extended family. It is set primarily in New York and Connecticut, with Massachusetts doubling for working-class Long Island and New Haven. Locations include a bowling alley in Wakefield, Lesley University in Cambridge, a baseball field at Bemis Park in Watertown, the South End Buttery in Boston, the old Commerce High School building in downtown Worcester. 

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Affleck is coming off an impressive turn in Ridley Scott's "The Last Duel" and is generating Oscar buzz for his performance as Uncle Charlie, the charismatic barkeep. He earned a Golden Globe nomination last month, calling his part in the movie “profoundly lucky.”

“Every once in a while, something great happens in your life and you hope you’re ready and able to capitalize on that,” he said during a virtual press conference held Dec. 13 with Sheridan, Rabe, Lloyd, Ranieri, Briana Middleton, screenwriter William Monahan and producer Grant Heslov.

Filming started in February and wrapped mid-April after shooting in a neighborhood near South Shore Plaza. Clooney spent two days filming interior and exterior scenes at 45 Calvin St., with an old Pontiac guzzler parked in front of the home of JR’s estranged father (Max Martini). The confrontation between JR and his dad is pivotal in the narrative.

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 “The Tender Bar” is based on Pulitzer-winning author J.R. Moehringer’s 2005 memoir about a bartender (Affleck) who takes his fatherless nephew under his wing. “It’s about a guy who loves his family and his family loved him,” said Monahan, a Dorchester native and UMass.-Amherst grad who also wrote Martin Scorsese’s crime drama, “The Departed,” which was filmed in Boston and Quincy.

Besides Grandpa’s house in Lowell, the other central set is Jacobs Corner Bar & Grill in Beverly, which was transformed into the fictional pub The Dickens, after the English writer, where Affleck serves whiskey and wisdom. He said he recognized a lot of his own father in Charlie.

“My father was a self-taught guy, didn’t go to college, but was very interested in language and storytelling,” Affleck said. “He imbued in me at a young age an interest in that. You didn’t have to be a fancy person or a rich person or have gone to a cool school to use language well and understand it. The power of storytelling is available to everybody in a democratic way.”

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"The Tender Bar" is a reunion for Affleck and Clooney, who worked together as producers on “Argo,” which won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2013.

Clooney, he said, “created this enormously welcoming, safe, beautiful atmosphere where you felt you could succeed and take chances. One of his many gifts is his deep understanding of (and) his tremendous affinity and fondness for actors.

“I get that he still sees himself as this guy showing up in L.A., sleeping on (producing partner) Grant Heslov’s couch. And he’s going to try to make it, knowing how hard that is, how much self-doubt is involved in that.

“He’s very generous and gives that to everyone. I feel my performance benefited from his experience, wisdom, talent and generosity.” 

The script also affords Affleck another chance to show his loyalty to his beloved Red Sox on big-screen.

During a phone conversation in an early scene of "The Tender Bar," a young JR (Ranieri) tells his deadbeat dad (Martini) he prefers to get tickets to the Mets game because “Uncle Charlie says the Yankees are as*****s.”

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The camera cuts to Affleck, slyly nodding his approval of the boy’s proclamation.

By the way, this isn’t the first time Affleck has thrown a cinematic strike against the hated rivals of the Sox. In 2014, he had a dust-up with “Gone Girl” director David Fincher over wearing a Yankees cap during a scene. The row paused production for four days. He ended up settling for a neutral New York Mets hat.

So, that’s Affleck 2, Yankees, 0.

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Reach Dana Barbuto at dbarbuto@patriotledger.com.