Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck. Ben and Jennifer. Or, as they’re famously known: Bennifer, the couple name that came from blending their names. In millennial and internet slang, ‘shipping’ is when people want two individuals—often fictional characters—to be together. Bennifer was one of Hollywood’s most iconic and beloved couples, giving fans hope in the idea of unfinished love. But how did their story begin?
Their love story kicked off in 2002 and could easily be seen as a real-life romantic tragicomedy. It has all the elements: the introduction, the conflict with an unresolved plot, and a dramatic, bittersweet twist in what seemed like it could have been a fairy tale ending. Here’s a timeline of Jennifer López and Ben Affleck’s relationship(s) and breakup(s).
2002: Boy Meets Girl
JLo and Ben first met in early 2002, during the filming of Gigli, directed by Martin Brest, the first movie they starred in together. Despite being one of Hollywood’s biggest flops, critics ironically noted the lack of chemistry between the two on screen.
20 years ago today, ‘Gigli’ starring Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck was released in theaters. pic.twitter.com/96gfycErjx
At that time, Jennifer was married to dancer Cris Judd. However, in June 2002, she finalized her divorce from her second marriage due to ‘irreconcilable differences,’ leaving the door open for a new romance to develop naturally. Jennifer says that, at first, what grew between her and Ben was purely friendship.
After months of rumors and paparazzi photos, the couple made their relationship official with an engagement in November of that same year. Jennifer, clearly in love, shared all the details of the proposal in a prime-time interview with Diane Sawyer. It happened at Ben’s parents’ house in Boston, where he gave her a six-carat pink diamond ring worth over two million dollars.
The early 2000s were all about the rise of tabloid journalism, where paparazzi and gossip magazines would do anything for a juicy headline and a front-page photo. It was in this environment that the music video for ‘Jenny from the Block’ was created, a song from JLo’s second studio album, This Is Me… Then. Directed by Francis Lawrence, the video focuses on the intrusion into her private life and her love story with Ben, who also stars in it. That’s why you see scenes shot with hidden cameras in different locations.
The Tabloids Wrecked Their Romance
In 2003, Bennifer starred in their second movie together, Jersey Girl, directed by Kevin Smith. Unfortunately, like Gigli, it ended up being another box office flop. That year, the media spotlight and the ‘excessive interest of the press’ put a lot of pressure on the couple, leading them to postpone their wedding just days before it was supposed to happen in September.
In July, tabloids speculated that Ben had cheated on Jennifer with another woman during a visit to a club in Vancouver. Jennifer didn’t believe these rumors and was really upset that the press turned a gathering with friends into something as serious as infidelity.
Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck open up about their 2003 breakup in the documentary ‘The Greatest Love Story Never Told.’ pic.twitter.com/eSstHI7K3z
Six months later, in January 2004, they called off their engagement and ended their relationship, blaming the constant paparazzi harassment for their breakup. With the relationship ending on good terms, both Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck went their separate ways.
JLo
López continued her music and film career, releasing five albums and starring in ten movies. She started dating singer Marc Anthony, whom she secretly married in June 2004. Together, they had two children. Their marriage lasted seven years until 2011, when they announced their separation and later finalized their divorce in April of the following year.
In 2017, JLo met former baseball player Alex Rodriguez. They got engaged but never made it down the aisle. After four years together and a postponed wedding due to the pandemic, they called off their engagement in April 2021.
Ben Affleck
Meanwhile, Affleck married actress Jennifer Garner in 2005, with whom he co-starred in Daredevil and Pearl Harbor. After 10 years of marriage and three children together, they announced their separation and divorce in 2015.
Following a brief long-distance romance with producer Lindsay Shookus between 2017 and 2018, the Argo star started a new relationship with Ana de Armas in March 2020 after they met during the filming of Deep Water. Their relationship lasted until January 2021.
2022: Did They Live Happily Ever After?
They say sequels are never as good as the original, and while Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck seemed like they might be the exception, they couldn’t completely avoid the typical Hollywood storyline.
In April 2021, the two rekindled their past relationship, though it wasn’t officially confirmed until a few months later. Photos of the couple looking cozy while heading to dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s restaurant in the Pendry Hotel in West Hollywood, as reported by Page Six, left little doubt that Bennifer was back.
A year later, they got engaged, and this time they made it official… twice! First, with an intimate and private ceremony in Las Vegas, and then with a big wedding in Georgia.
The intense and very real love JLo felt back then became a source of inspiration for her once again, 20 years later. While This Is Me… Then captured her deep feelings for Affleck (with the song ‘Dear Ben’ dedicated to him), her album This Is Me… Now revisits that love with even more intensity (featuring Dear Ben pt. II coming in 2024), turning it into a fairy tale whose happiness, to everyone’s surprise, had an expiration date.
2024: The Divorce Plot Twist We Didn’t See Coming… or Did We?
Everything seemed to be going well for the Lopez-Affleck family. JLo was excited about getting back on stage across North America when, out of nowhere, alarms started ringing. In May, without any explanation, she first canceled seven concerts from her ‘This Is Me… Live’ tour, and later, she called off the entire tour. “I wouldn’t do this unless it was absolutely necessary,” she announced on her website.
Meanwhile, rumors of marital trouble were gaining more and more traction in the media and among fans. In Touch Weekly reported, “They’re heading for divorce, and for once, it’s not Ben’s fault! He’s now focusing on his work and his kids. Ben has already moved out, and they’ll likely have to sell the dream house they spent two years finding. They’ll never stop loving each other, but she can’t control him, and he can’t change her. There was no way it could have lasted.”
Three months later—during a time when it was clear they were living in separate homes, didn’t spend vacations together, and didn’t celebrate their birthdays together—on August 21, 2024, all the rumors about the couple were confirmed: JLo filed for divorce from Ben Affleck, though they had actually been separated since April 26.
Will they part ways on good terms or with a messy breakup? There are still details to uncover in this on-and-off story that hasn’t yet reached its ‘THE END’.
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