Jennifer Garner Says Mark Ruffalo Almost Quit 13 Going on 30 After Rehearsing ‘Thriller’ Scene: ‘Not for Me’

13 Continues 30 fans almost missed Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo’s iconic “Thriller” dance scene!

On Thursday, Poor people actor, 56, received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles.

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During the ceremony, his friend and ex Project Adam costar, 51, spoke at the podium in his honor and reminded the audience that the world was almost robbed of a pop culture moment 20 years ago.

While speaking at the event, she wondered if Reese Witherspoon, Jennifer Aniston, Gwyneth Paltrow and Keira Knightley — who have also played Ruffalo’s on-screen romantic interests — agreed with her that Ruffalo owes his “rom-com success to messy hair, an unbuttoned cute button , and both became the norm for cute guys everywhere for the next 20 years.”

Mark Ruffalo and Jennifer Garner.

Frazer Harrison/Getty

“I wonder if these esteemed ladies enjoyed Mark’s angst as much as I did,” Garner continued. “I wonder if he tried to give up on their movies, like he did ours after the first dance rehearsal of ‘Thriller,’ where Mark went from kind of shocked that we actually had to do this, to nervous, to deathly quiet, to ‘Dude, this it’s not for me.'”

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IN 13 Continues 30Garner played the grown-up version of Jenna Rink, a teenager who wakes up in 2004 to find a 30-year-old magazine editor. Jenna finds herself at a party that no one is enjoying – that is until she asks the DJ for a booth playing Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”

Jennifer Garner, Mark Ruffalo.

Tracy Bennett/Columbia Tri Star/Kobal/Shutterstock

Garner’s character recruits a reluctant Matt “Matty” Flamhaff (Ruffalo) to perform the choreography featured in Jackson’s 1983 music video, saving the party.

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The couple jokingly recreated the moment on Thursday.

Mark Ruffalo and Jennifer Garner.

Matt Baron/BEI/Shutterstock

The ceremony wasn’t the first time Garner revealed that Ruffalo wanted no part of the routine. In March 2021, Garner told theSkimm that he almost drew the line at that dance scene.

“We started learning dance. Our first rehearsal, I think it was Mark and Judy [Greer] both me and Judy and I were dancers growing up and poor Mark didn’t know it. And he came and hated the rehearsal process so much that he almost gave up,” she said.

Columbia Tri Star/Kobal/Shutterstock

The the Avengers the actor also commented on PEOPLE’s coverage of the conversation via Instagram.

“It didn’t help that it took me 3 hours to learn what Jen mastered in about 20 minutes!” he joked then.

Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo.

Michael Loccisano/WireImage

Garner, who was a last-minute fill-in speaker for Laura Dern and Don Cheadle on Thursday, couldn’t be more proud to have worked and bonded with her co-star.

“To work with you, Mark, is to love you, I don’t care what anyone says,” Garner said, adding that it was a “privilege” to know him.

Ruffalo is the 2,772nd person to receive a star on the street, according to a press release.

Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige, actors Barry Keoghan and Lili Reinhart, and the Avengers director Joss Whedon was among his peers who attended the event.

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Source: HIS Education