BEN AND J.LO REUNITE!
BENNIFER 2.0! HOW THE SINGLE SUPERSTARS HAVE RECONNECTED AFTER BRUTAL BREAK-UPS
Weeks after officially pulling the plug on her flailing engagement to baseball star Alex Rodriguez, Jennifer Lopez has found comfort in the company of another former fiancé, actor Ben Affleck. The once iconic duo have hung out together multiple times at Lopez’s seven-bedroom Bel-Air mansion since she returned to Los Angeles after shooting Shotgun Wedding in the Dominican Republic. “They are friends,” a source told WHO’s sister publication People magazine. “They have always been friends and they have seen each other through the years.”
Now that they’re both single, their friendship is sizzling. “Ben and Jen have been talking in private a lot over the past few months, and now the world knows just how close the two of them are again,” a source told OK! magazine. “When things started to get worse with Alex Rodriguez, Jen turned to Ben for advice.”
Affleck, 48, who split with girlfriend Ana de Armas in January, was first spotted at Hotel Bel-Air on April 22 being dropped off by a white SUV — which later drove Lopez, 51, to a meeting. On April 28, he was again spied coming out of Lopez’s Bel-Air home, and the next day, he was picked up by the same white car to go to Lopez’s home where he stayed for around three and a half hours. “Security picks him up at a nearby location and drops him off after spending a few hours at her house,” reports a source of their courtship.
It’s little wonder that keeping their connection under wraps is a priority for the pair, considering intense media attention is said to have been a significant factor in their initial break-up. When the
“They’ve always been friends”
– SOURCE
pair met in 2002 on the Gigli film set, Lopez was married to her second husband, backup dancer Cris Judd, whom she divorced in 2003. Lopez and Affleck went public with their romance shortly after – and “Bennifer” was born. They soon became the most buzzed-about couple in Hollywood, whether preened to perfection on red carpets or as the subject of countless paparazzi stake-outs.
Before the year’s end, Affleck proposed with a 6.1-carat custom-made Harry Winston pink diamond solitaire ring. Beyond the bling, Lopez said in an interview with Diane Sawyer that their seemingly unlikely bond ran deep. “We’re from the same kind of background, had the same kind of upbringing and same kind of family and same kind of house,” she said. “He is brilliantly smart,” she added. “Loving. Charming. Affectionate. And I just admire him in every way. I respect him; I feel like he teaches me things.”
Together, they learned from their mistakes about how to handle the glare of the spotlight. After being hounded by the paparazzi, Lopez used their notoriety in the much-mocked music video for her song ‘Jenny from the Block’, which featured paparazzi shots of herself and Affleck in intimate situations. “If I have a regret, it was doing the music video. But that happened years ago,” Affleck said in 2008, adding he held no grudges. “I’ve moved on … For the record, did she hurt my career? No.”
In a 2016 interview with People magazine, Lopez insisted that they never set out to hog headlines. “We didn’t try to have a public relationship,” she said. “We just happened to be together at the birth of the tabloids, and it was like, ‘Oh my God.’ It was just a lot of pressure.”
So much pressure that it caused them to call off their Santa Barbara wedding just days before their
scheduled date in September 2003. “When we found ourselves seriously contemplating hiring three separate ‘decoy brides’ at three different locations, we realised that something was awry,” they said in a joint statement at the time. “We began to feel that the spirit of what should have been the happiest day of our lives could be compromised.”
The couple briefly split up but rekindled their relationship only to officially call it quits in January 2004. By June 2004, Lopez was married to Marc Anthony, with whom she shares 13-year-old twins Max and Emme.
A year later, Affleck married Jennifer Garner, who is mum to his three children, Violet, 15, Seraphina, 12, and Samuel, 9.
In a January interview, Affleck reflected on how rude the media coverage of Lopez was when they were together. “People were so f--king mean about her – sexist, racist. Ugly, vicious s--t was written about her in ways that if you wrote it now, you would literally be fired,” he told The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast. “Now it’s like, she’s lionised and respected for the work she did, where she came from, what she accomplished – as well she f--king should be!” He also took the time to talk up his ex for her May cover story for InStyle magazine. “She remains the hardestworking person I’ve come across in this business,” he gushed. “She has great talent, but she has also worked very hard for her success, and I’m so happy that she seems to be getting the credit she deserves.”
Affleck also jokingly teased Lopez, saying, “Where are you keeping the fountain of youth? Why do you look the same as you did in 2003 and it kind of looks like I’m in my 40s … at best?”
Lopez accepted the praise and returned the compliment to Affleck, telling the magazine, “Ben is funny! He still looks pretty good, too.”
Over the years, Lopez has wondered if things could have ended differently between her and Affleck. “I think different time, different thing, who knows what could’ve happened?” she told People in 2016. “There was a genuine love there.” It turns out that timing is everything. “It’s no coincidence that Ben’s been praising Jen to high heaven now that he’s single again,” a source has reportedly told Heat magazine. “It’s an open secret they’re still very much into each other.”
• By Jennie Noonan