20 years of Bennifer, explained.
Just like the opening of Jennifer Lopez’s movie musical This Is Me… Now — where the multihyphenate’s unnamed character and the mysterious love of her life (played by and representing Ben Affleck) are thrown from a motorcycle in a crash that symbolically breaks her heart — the real Jennifer Lopez has filed for divorce from the real Ben Affleck.
The split comes after months of tabloid scrutiny and anonymously sourced stories that the two were headed for separation. Lopez and Affleck were reportedly living separately and extremely unhappy with being married to each other. He allegedly wants a life away from the spotlight, and she can’t stop living in it.
If this all sounds familiar, it’s because it’s all eerily similar to what happened 20 years ago when the couple, known as Bennifer, first broke up. After a magnetic first meeting on a movie set, the two began dating and quickly became one of the most sought-after celebrity couples. Gossip rags and paparazzi were there to capture their every breath. The couple eventually called it quits, blaming the outsize media attention for their demise. And now it feels like we’re once again back at the original Bennifer breakup.
Bennifer isn’t the first celebrity couple nor will they be the last, but they represent something rare in Hollywood: a real — and really dramatic — relationship. Something that wasn’t made for PR, but captures so, so much of it. They are two very famous people in love who have tried to live and love authentically in an industry where that’s extremely risky. Their relationship also reflects our fixation with realness and relatability: If they didn’t have either, we wouldn’t be so engrossed by them.
Given the current media fervor, here’s a look at what the two represent — solo, together, split — that makes us so obsessed with them some 20 years later.The complete relationship timeline of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez, a.k.a. Bennifer
December 2001–November 2002: The birth of Bennifer
Affleck and Lopez meet on the set of Gigli, which begins shooting in December 2001. Originally, Halle Berry had been offered Lopez’s role, but had to drop out due to scheduling conflict with 2003’s X-Men sequel X2. Lopez is married to backup dancer Chris Judd at the time, but files for divorce in summer 2002, ending their 10-month marriage. Lopez and Affleck officially begin dating shortly after.
The media refers to the couple as “Bennifer,” a combination of their first names. Allegedly, director Kevin Smith coined the portmanteau while directing the two on the set of his movie Jersey Girl. Bennifer starts a trend of the media bestowing celebrity couples with mashed-up nicknames like Brangelina (Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie) and TomKat (Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes).
On November 5, 2002, Lopez premieres her music video for “Jenny From the Block” on TRL. The video stars Affleck, and is about how Lopez and Affleck can’t find any privacy. They’re hounded by paparazzi at every turn. The video is also a flex because they are styled elegantly and doing glamorous things like hanging out on a yacht and lounging by the pool with a bottle of champagne. The gist: Everyone wants a piece of them because they’re the It couple.
November 10, 2002: Bennifer’s engaged
In an exclusive interview with ABC News’s Diane Sawyer, Lopez confirms that she and Affleck are engaged. At first, Lopez plays coy, telling Sawyer that the two were very “secure” in their relationship. According to ABC News, Lopez calls Affleck during a break in the interview, and they decide to go on the record about their engagement. Lopez tells Sawyer that Affleck’s proposal “was traditional, but also in a very spectacular way, as of course Ben would do it.”
August 2003–January 2004: Bennifer bombs out
Bennifer is now the most famous couple in Hollywood that isn’t married. Tabloids love them. Their wedding plans are in every magazine. Her engagement ring, a Harry Winston pink diamond the size of a meteorite, seems to have its own gravitational pull. The wedding is reportedly going to be a gigantic, multimillion-dollar Hollywood affair.
The plan is to tie the knot in September, right after the August release of Gigli, the movie the two worked on together. People ostensibly want to see Gigli to witness the spark that created Bennifer, captured onscreen. Gigli, unfortunately, turns out to be an awful film, one of the worst movies that a group of humans has ever created. Critics ravage the often offensive idiocy of the script, its flat camera work, and its supernatural ability to bore. It flops at the box office, bringing in only $7 million worldwide.
Every tabloid focuses on how Bennifer was handling Gigli’s absolute failure. Then in early August, Affleck visits Brandi’s Exotic Nightclub in Vancouver, Canada. Reportedly Lopez is upset, but through their spokespeople, the couple says everything is fine and that he had always planned to go to the strip club. Whispers of Lopez’s uneasiness sharpen into tabloids declaring that there is trouble in paradise, and Bennifer is rapidly deteriorating ahead of their storybook wedding.
Days before the ceremony, post-Gigli and post-Brandi’s, the couple sends an announcement officially postponing their nuptials. “Due to the excessive media attention surrounding our wedding, we have decided to postpone the date,” Lopez and Affleck say in a joint statement. “We felt what should have been a joyful and sacred day could be spoiled for us, our families and our friends.”
The couple officially calls it quits in January 2004.
January 2004–April 2021: The solo days (kind of)
Apart, the couple moves on. Lopez marries singer Marc Anthony in June 2004; the two have twins in 2008, but divorce in 2014. In 2019, she gets engaged to former Yankee Alex Rodriguez, breaking up in early 2021. As of early 2021, her career is on the up, as she stars in Hustlers and performs at the Super Bowl.
Affleck marries actor Jennifer Garner (a Bennifer reboot, of sorts, with new casting) in June 2005, and they have three children. After his public struggles with alcoholism, their divorce is finalized in 2018. Affleck’s career over this period is a little more uneven, with high highs and low lows — Argo, which he directed, wins the Best Picture Oscar in 2012, but he also becomes the reluctant hero of inescapable, existential sadness.
