Jennifer Garner got candid about her feelings over the fire in L.A. and losing a friend in them.
Jennifer Garner opened up about the deep emotional impact the devastating wildfires in Los Angeles County have had on her Pacific Palisades community, sharing the heartbreaking loss of a friend in the fires.
“I did lose a friend and for our church it’s really tender,” the Alias alum revealed during a Jan. 10 interview with MSNBC, alongside chef José Andrés. “So I don’t feel like I should talk about her yet. But yeah, I did lose a friend who did not get out in time.”
Garner, 52, who shares children Violet, 19, Seraphina, 15, and Samuel, 12, with ex-husband Ben Affleck, spoke of the overwhelming devastation around her.
“I can write out a list of 100 friends who lost their homes,” she said, acknowledging the emotional toll of seeing her own home remain unscathed.
“I feel almost guilty walking through my house,” she admitted, prompting her to question how she could contribute during such difficult times.
“What can I do? How can I help? What can I offer? What do I have to offer with these hands and these walls and the safety that I have?”
Garner continued, “My heart bleeds for my friends. I mean, I can think of 100 families, and there are 5,000 homes lost. I’ve lived in and around the Palisades for 25 years. So I think all of us just—we want to get our hands into working somehow to be helpful. It is not some far away place that you can’t reach.”
To channel her efforts into tangible help, Garner teamed up with Chef José and his World Central Kitchen, a disaster relief organization he founded in 2010 that has provided meals during crises worldwide.
“It’s what World Central Kitchen does,” Andrés explained. “We activated one hour after the fire began.”
As the fires grew, the organization scaled up its efforts. “We kept adding more team members, more food trucks,” Andrés said.
“We’re feeding people in shelters, we’re feeding first responders, we are adapting, because the situation keeps evolving day by day.”
Garner expressed admiration for the swift response and support from World Central Kitchen and Andrés’ team.
“It is an incredible thing to watch somebody, to watch World Central Kitchen and Chef José just come in and just, ‘We’ve got this handled, don’t worry. We’ve got you.'”
