The love spell has been broken. Bennifer is over (again).
On Aug. 20, Jennifer Lopez filed for divorce from her longtime love Ben Affleck after only two years of marriage and three years together. A legion of fans are mourning the rekindling of Lopez and Affleck’s second-chance romance after two decades of being part.
However, the details of the end of their high-profile relationship are muddled as their on-again-off-again romance. Despite the breakup, Lopez and Affleck’s relationship has spanned years from movie sets to becoming the celebrity couple Bennifer the media couldn’t stop theorizing about — even two decades after their initial split.
So how did the fractured and tumultuous fairy tale between a pop singer from The Bronx and an actor-director from Massachusetts end up in a romance that spanned two decades and encompassed multiple marriages and children?
Salon dives into Lopez and Affleck’s two-decade-long love affair from meeting on the set of “Gigli” to their second attempt at love.
2002: Affleck and Lopez meet on the “Gigli” set
Twenty-two years ago, the pair famously met on the movie set of “Gigli,” in which Affleck plays a bumbling mobster and Lopez plays the woman who helps him kidnap a young man. During the filming of the romance crime drama, Lopez was at the time married to her second husband, Cris Judd. However, the couple divorced a year later and not long after, Lopez and Affleck went public with their relationship.
In 2016, Lopez told People Magazine that, “I really felt like when I met Ben, ‘OK, this is it.’ [But] sometimes I feel like what you think people are and how you see them when you love them is different than when they reveal later.”
They would soon quickly become one of Hollywood’s most popular couples, giving them the hybrid celebrity couple name Bennifer. Affleck even starred in Lopez’s iconic “Jenny From The Block” music video.
November 2002: The pair get engaged
Not long after the couple filmed their movie, in an interview with Diane Sawyer, Lopez revealed she was engaged to Affleck. She said it was “traditional, but also in a very spectacular way, as of course Ben would do it . . . it was very, very beautiful.”
According to People Magazine at the time, Affleck proposed with a custom-made Harry Winston pink-diamond solitaire ring.
August 2003: The world premiere of “Gigli”
Following the couple’s engagement, they had reached new heights of celebrity couple stardom. However, “Gigli” was panned by critics and suffered from poor office box returns. The film currently sits at 6% on Rotten Tomatoes with a critical consensus stating, “Bizarre and clumsily plotted, ‘Gigli’ is a mess. As for its stars, Affleck and Lopez lack chemistry.”
Affleck even admitted on “The Tonight Show” that the movie “wasn’t good,” and they “got buried.”
September 2003: Lopez and Affleck postpone their wedding
Right before the couple’s wedding, they announced they were postponing their ceremony in a statement. Lopez and Affleck cited that the media frenzy around their relationship led to the postponement.
The statement said, “Due to the excessive media attention surrounding our wedding, we have decided to postpone the date. When we found ourselves seriously contemplating hiring three separate ‘decoy brides’ at three different locations, we realized that something was awry.
“We felt what should have been a joyful and sacred day could be spoiled for us, our families and our friends,” they added.
January 2004: Lopez and Affleck break up
People reported that the couple split after their canceled wedding but they had in fact rekindled their relationship. However, this attempt to salvage their relationship was unsuccessful, and they officially called it off four months later.
A statement from Lopez said, “Jennifer Lopez has ended her engagement to Ben Affleck. At this difficult time, we ask that you respect her privacy.”
Affleck’s spokesperson said, “I am not going to confirm anything about his personal life. We don’t want to get dragged into quicksand. Everybody wants a war. It’s not happening from our side.”
March 2004: Lopez and Affleck costar in their second movie
Directed by Kevin Smith, “Jersey Girl” stars Affleck as a single father whose wife (Lopez) dies giving birth to their daughter. The movie, filmed while the couple was still together, was released only two months after the couple split and was better received than “Gigli” but not by much.
2005-2020: Lopez and Affleck lead separate lives with others
Months after Lopez and Affleck’s relationship ended, Lopez married singer Marc Anthony. She had two children with Anthony but the relationship lasted seven years before they’d get a divorce in 2011.
“We have decided to end our marriage,” the couple said in a statement to E! News. “This was a very difficult decision. We have come to amicable conclusion on all matters. It is a painful time for all involved and we appreciate the respect of our privacy at this time.”
Affleck also moved on from Lopez shortly after with his former co-star and actress Jennifer Garner, his “Daredevil” costar. The pair went public with their relationship in 2004 with an engagement a year later. They were married in 2005 and had three children. While the couple kept a low profile in the public eye, in 2015 they announced their divorce after 11 years together.
“After much thought and careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to divorce,” the couple said in a statement. “We go forward with love and friendship for one another and a commitment to co-parenting our children whose privacy we ask to be respected during this difficult time.”
While Lopez and Affleck entered other high-profile relationships after their marriages with baseball player Alex Rodriguez and actress Ana De Armas, respectively, they remained supportive of each other’s work. In 2020, Affleck said that Lopez “should have been nominated [for ‘Hustlers’]. She’s the real thing. I keep in touch periodically with her and have a lot of respect for her. How awesome is it that she had her biggest hit movie at 50? That’s f***ing baller.”
April 2021: Two decades after their initial split, Lopez and Affleck reunite
Following Lopez’s split from Rodriguez, it was reported that she began spending time with Affleck. It was not long after that they were spotted in Montana together in a car, near a resort where Affleck has a home.
July 2021: Bennifer 2.0 goes Instagram official
For the singer’s 52nd birthday, she posted a series of photos on Instagram. Many of the photos were of the singer in a bathing suit and on a boat. However, the final photo was a picture of Lopez and Affleck kissing.
This was the first time the couple acknowledged their rekindled romance after tabloids and social media had been theorizing about their relationship.
In an interview with People, Lopez shared “I feel so lucky and happy and proud to be with him. It’s a beautiful love story that we got a second chance.”
April 2022: Lopez and Affleck are engaged again
The second time’s the charm. Lopez shared the news of their engagement on her JLO newsletter after she was photographed with an engagement ring. She revealed the news in the email to her fans. The message also included a clip of Lopez admiring the green diamond.
Lopez teased the “major announcement” with a video on Twitter too. “So I have a really exciting and special story to share . . . ” she said to her followers. She also added a diamond ring emoji to her Twitter handle.
In the blog post, she wrote, “Did you ever imagine your biggest dream could come true? Saturday night while at my favorite place on earth (in the bubble bath), my beautiful love got on one knee and proposed. I was taken totally off guard and just looked in his eyes smiling and crying at the same time trying hard to get my head around the fact that after 20 years this was happening all over again, I was quite literally speechless and he said, ‘is that a yes?’ I said YES of course that’s a YES.”
July 2022: Lopez and Affleck get married in Las Vegas
In the newsletter, the singer shared that she and Affleck wed in Las Vegas. In her post, she revealed that the wedding was the “best night ever” and stated that the couple’s children were “the best witnesses.”
Lopez said, “It’s a beautiful outcome that this has happened in this way at this time in our lives where we can really appreciate and celebrate each other and respect each other. We always did, but we have even more of an appreciation because we know that life can take you in different directions.”
She continued, “We have been in the game in the public eye long enough to know who we are as people and what really matters and what doesn’t matter. We have kids and we respect each other. . . . We really live our lives in a way we can be proud of and our kids can be proud of you.”
“We’re just operating from a place of love and respect for everyone in our lives and that is very important to us. We know what the truth is [and] we hold it sacred,” she concluded.
August 2022: Lopez and Affleck celebrate their marriage in Georgia
The pair shared their love with their close friends and family in Georgia where Affleck owns a home,
In her blog, the singer said she walked down the “aisle that would lead me toward the rest of my life.”
“When he saw me appear at the top of the stairs that moment it both made absolute sense while seeming still impossibly hard to believe, like the best dream, where all you want is never to awaken,” Lopez wrote. “I would have had many of the same thoughts probably had I not been focusing so hard on not tripping over my dress, but when I got close enough to see his face, it made the same wonderful sense to me.
“Some old wounds were healed that day and the weight of the past finally lifted off our shoulders. Full-circle — and not at all the way we planned it. Better,” she said.
Lopez also shared photos of the wedding including one of the newlyweds walking up the aisle together, a photo of the duo holding each other under a sign that says “Mr. and Mrs. Affleck.”
February 2024: Lopez releases “This Is Me . . . Now”
As the couple grew into their newfound relationship appearing at each other’s movie premieres, getting matching tattoos, starring in Super Bowl Dunkin commercials and blending their families, Lopez was also working on her ninth studio album “This Is Me . . . Now.”
In an interview with Zane Lowe about the album, Lopez said “When [Affleck] came back into my life, again the same thing happened where I felt so inspired and so overtaken with emotion that it was just pouring out of me. When I feel good, I write music. And I wrote music and I got in the studio in I think May, and by August when we got married, it was done.”
In the documentary about the making of her album, Affleck said, “Getting back together, I said, ‘Listen, one of the things I don’t want is a relationship on social media,’ Then I sort of realized it’s not a fair thing to ask. It’s sort of like, you’re gonna marry a boat captain and you go, ‘Well, I don’t like the water.'”
Lopez added, “I don’t think [Ben] is very comfortable with me doing all of this. But he loves me, he knows I’m an artist, and he’s gonna support me in every way he can, because he knows you can’t stop me from making the music I made . . . he doesn’t want to stop me. But that doesn’t mean he’s comfortable being the muse.”
June 2024: Affleck moves out of the couple’s shared house
After months of speculation about the status of their relationship due to a lack of public appearances together, People Magazine sources said that Affleck moved out of the couple’s home in Los Angeles. Despite the reports, Lopez and Affleck were seen together at the high school graduation of one of Affleck’s daughters. However, there were reports that the couple had been on the outs for months and were looking to put their mansion on the market.
Lopez also abruptly canceled her 2024 tour. Live Nation said in a statement, “Jennifer is taking time off to be with her children, family and close friends.”
August 2024: Lopez files for divorce after two years
On Tuesday, Aug. 20, Lopez filed the petition to end the couple’s marriage in Los Angeles. The court filing was first reported by TMZ and confirmed by multiple sources to People Magazine.
In the court filing, the musician and actress listed that April 26 was the couple’s official date of separation. Lopez also filed for the divorce herself without using a lawyer, which means she is technically representing herself, People stated. There is no confirmation if the couple had a prenuptial agreement, as the singer did not mention one in the court filing. Sources told TMZ the couple did not have one.
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