For Jennifer Garner, nothing beats a classic girls’ weekend away—complete with sweatpants, pizza, and dancing like no one is watching.
In her new series, The Five-Star Weekend, which is streaming on Peacock as of July 9, the archetypal girls’ trip is taken to the next level. Adapted from the 2023 novel by Elin Hilderbrand, Garner plays Hollis Shaw, a famous food blogger who suffers a life-changing loss and plans a weekend away by the coast in an attempt to process her grief, inviting four friends from different phases of her life and greeting them each with a gift basket. None of these women had met each other before the trip and, of course, not everything goes quite to plan: characters clash, secrets are spilled, and new bonds are forged over the course of the eight 45-minute episodes.
The series’ all-star cast—also including Chloë Sevigny, Gemma Chan, Regina Hall, and D’Arcy Carden—had also never met prior to filming. “I was so nervous to meet Chloë,” Garner tells me. “Our careers circled each other, but we’ve never been in anything together. She’s been on a pedestal for me.” Gemma Chan agrees, confirming that Sevigny is “the ultimate cool girl.” They needn’t have worried. After filming scenes playing a game of “Never Have I Ever,” running into the sea, and a “pajama dance party in the freezing cold,” (“There was no actual alcohol involved, but it looks like there was,” Garner says), the five women bonded in no time.
On the small screen, it’s still relatively rare to see stories about female friendship—especially midlife female friendship—portrayed with depth and nuance. This is something Garner, who is also executive producer of the series, hopes will change going forward. “I hope people watch this and have a blast,” she says. “You have women in their 30s, 40s, 50s, talking about perimenopause and menopause, but it’s not pedantic and it’s not an eye roll. It’s just [presented as] part of life: talking about kids, comparing kids, success and failure, marriage being hard.”
That honesty is partly what makes this story feel refreshing. “We’re all fed this idea that this has to happen by this age, this has to happen by then, and it just isn’t that way,” Garner says. “It’s all so much more open. I’m 54 and I was told forever I would never work after 40. Knock on wood, and we’ll see, but I’m still here.”
If she were to give her younger self advice at the start of her career? “Don’t stop learning other things,” Garner says. “Don’t make this your whole world. It’s kind of impossible sometimes, but stay open to the rest of the world.” For Garner, that’s cooking as much as she can, much like her character, Hollis—she even has her own “pretend cooking show” on Instagram—and spending time with her three children, whom she shares with her ex-husband, Ben Affleck.
D’Arcy Carden, Regina Hall, Chloë Sevigny, Jennifer Garner, and Gemma Chan in The Five-Star Weekend.
Now, two decades after filming the original 13 Going on 30 (it’s been reported that she is on board as an executive producer for Netflix’s official reboot), it feels as though Garner is enjoying the next chapter of her career. This one, perhaps, feels more closely aligned with The Five-Star Weekend, which asks what happens to women’s friendships and identities as we age.
It’s a question that resonates with the rest of the cast, too. When asked what it takes to sustain those long-term friendships, Chan responds: “I would say a lack of judgment and a bit of forgiveness.” Garner concurs, adding: “That’s something that you learn as you get older; just don’t let those things get in the way of a real friendship. Even if you haven’t spoken in forever, just pick it up. Don’t get your feelings hurt by life happening.”
As for her new Five-Star Weekend friends? “I’ve learned how rare it is to get to work with a group of women,” Garner says. “It is heaven! I don’t want to go back.”
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