Ana de Armas says her highly publicized relationship with Ben Affleck was ‘horrible’ to live through

While Ana de Armas might insist that she’s no action heroine, her acting career certainly seems to be making a beeline for that line of work. The latest instance of this is The Gray Man, the new action thriller by the Russo Brothers that stars de Armas in a star-studded cast opposite Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans.

Since the movie is going on a limited theatrical run in a matter of days, the Cuban-Spanish actress has once again become the talk of the town. Ana has graced the cover of Elle‘s August issue, in which she dishes about her career, from landing a role in No Time to Die as a Bond girl, to going on another similar venture with the Russo brothers, not to mention Dexter Fletcher’s upcoming action-romantic flick, Ghosted.

Between all of these high-profile projects, de Armas has also become infamous over the past year for appearing in the ghastly erotic thriller Deep Water alongside Ben Affleck, so it’s hardly surprising that the topic of her highly-scrutinized relationship with the American thespian also came up.

Apparently, that’s one of the reasons she left LA, to seek calmer waters.

“[It was] horrible,” de Armas says. “That’s one of the reasons why I left LA.”

The actress had already seen how the scrutiny of a relationship like that had ruined her colleagues’ lives, having to constantly deal with paparazzi and the like, so she sought an out.

“Going through it [myself] confirmed my thoughts about, ‘This is not the place for me to be.’ It became a little bit too much. There’s no escape. There’s no way out. It’s always the feeling of something that you don’t have, something missing. It’s a city that keeps you anxious.”

Ana is now living in New York, and all the happier for it since it’s closer to her home country of Spain.