JLO is having a moment
From Fly Girl to Oscar contender, performer is riding high these days
It is the year of Jennifer Lopez.
We’ve never stopped fangirling Lopez. But now, with a leading role in Hustlers, one of the biggest movies of the year, Lopez has been billed as the front-runner for just about every best actress award — including the Oscar, come February.
Although she kickstarted her career combining her talents — first as a Fly Girl on In Living Color in the early ’90s and later as Selena Quintanilla in 1997’s Selena — Lopez would go on to make a name for herself as a rom-com lead.
In a recent Hollywood Reporter roundtable, Lopez said: “When I first started, one of the things that I wanted to do, because I was Puerto Rican, Latina, was that I wanted to be in romantic comedies, because I felt like all the women in romantic comedies always looked the same way, they were always white. I am the hopeless romantic, I am the single working woman, I was those things. And I remember thinking, I need to be the lead in a romantic comedy. And that’s one of the things I went for and that’s one of the things me and my agents talked about.”
That concerted effort resulted in The Wedding Planner, Maid in Manhattan, The Back-up Plan, Shall We Dance, Monster-in-law, the recent Second Act and the upcoming Marry Me. She produced the latter two. In 2001, she famously had both the No. 1 movie (The Wedding Planner) and No. 1 album (J.LO) in the same week.
Still, there’s a difference between being a star and being a talent. And while there’s never been any mistaking Lopez can work a stage, she’s never been exalted for her acting. That’s even with a consistent acting career that’s spanned three decades, which recently saw her take the lead in crime series Shades of Blue.
After completing work on Hustlers, Lopez immediately went on tour, then had her 50th birthday, then walked in Versace’s show in Milan in a version of the green dress she had worn two decades before, then began shooting Marry Me.
But with Hustlers — in which Lopez plays Ramona, the captain of a crew of former strippers who con Wall Street-types for their money — the substance is undeniable. Substance is in the story, the role and the performance. Even the physicality: Lopez insisted director Lorene Scafaria include closeup shots of her face while dancing so audiences would no there was no stunt double at work.
It’s a role that holds the same swagger Lopez brought to Selena, Out of Sight (where she stole scenes from co-star George Clooney) and Enough, where she takes down her abusive ex-husband. It’s what she does best — on screen and off.
It’s present when she opens Hustlers with a spellbinding poledance routine to the tune of Fiona Apple’s Criminal (a not-so-odd musical choice Lopez made herself), when she comforts newbie stripper Destiny and tells her to “climb in my fur,” and when she rings up each lascivious man’s credit card, one by one.
Often celebrated for her music, right now it’s Lopez the actress who is racking up nominations — at the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild and Independent Spirit Awards.