Jennifer Lopez has revealed that she convinced her then-fourth husband Ben Affleck to finance her upcoming movie, Kiss of the Spider Woman, through his production company Artists Equity with BFF Matt Damon.
‘The movie wouldn’t have been made if it wasn’t for him and Artists Equity…I will always give him that credit,’ the 56-year-old pop diva Jennifer Lopez said on CBS Sunday Morning.
‘They financed it. I told him this was the role I was born to play and I wanted to do it, and he was like, “Okay,” and he helped make it happen.’
The 53-year-old Oscar winner Jennifer Lopez happens to be one of eight credited executive producers behind Bill Condon’s $30M-budget big-screen version of the 1992 West End musical, which hits US theaters October 10.
Jennifer Lopez pulled triple duty portraying Ingrid Luna, Aurora, and The Spider Woman in the Lionsgate flick, which currently has an 83% critic approval rating (out of 46 reviews) on Rotten Tomatoes.
‘This was the first [musical] I was meant to do,’ Lopez explained.
‘This is something I’m very excited for everybody to see. Yeah, I got to play three roles very different from who I am, from anything I’ve done. And you know, they were very distinct roles with very distinct emotional moments in the in the movie that were beautiful. It was a blessing. ‘
The two-time Grammy nominee said making Kiss of the Spider Woman was a ‘refuge’ from the deterioration of her two-year marriage to Ben, and their divorce was finalized on February 21.
‘Yes 100%. Yeah, it was. It was hard not to think about stuff,’ Jennifer admitted
‘But it it was like the best and the worst of times in a way because…every moment on set and every moment I was doing this role, I was so happy. And then back home it was not great. And it was just like, “How do I reconcile this?”
‘But you get through it. And you know, honestly, I have to say it was the best thing that ever happened to me because it changed me. It didn’t change me. It helped me grow in a way that I needed to grow [and] become more self-aware. I’m a different person now than I was…a year and a half ago.’
The couple formerly known as ‘Bennifer’ originally met filming Martin Brest’s box office bomb Gigli in 2001, split three days before their 2004 wedding, and began surreptitiously texting each other again in February 2021 – two months before she ended her engagement to Alex Rodriguez.
Last week, Lopez and Affleck relisted their 12-bedroom marital megamansion in Beverly Hills known as ‘The Crown Jewel of Wallingford’ for $52M on the real estate market after paying $60.85M for the property back in 2023.
On Monday, The Unstoppable producer-star shared an Instagram slideshow of herself relaxing on what appeared to a be a beach in the Hamptons and wrote: ‘Grateful for the sunsets, the seasons, and the moments that remind me how beautiful change and growth can be. Here’s to fall and everything ahead.’
On November 1, Jennifer will be honored with the Virtuoso Award at SCAD Savannah Film Festival in Georgia for her performance in Kiss of the Spider Woman.
Tonatiuh, Diego Luna, Bruno Bichir, Josefina Scaglione, and Aline Mayagoitia will also star in the big-screen adaptation of Manuel Puig’s 1976 novel about two Argentinian prisoners.
Chita Rivera – who died, age 91, on January 30 – originated the role of Aurora in all three productions staged in Toronto/West End in 1992, Broadway in 1993, and the national tour in 1996.
Sônia Braga starred in Héctor Babenco’s critically-acclaimed 1985 film adaptation, which earned $17M at the global box office.
Lopez’s other upcoming acting roles include Ol Parker’s rom-com Office Romance for Netflix, Robert Zemeckis’ thriller The Last Mrs. Parrish for Netflix, and she’ll produce Bob the Builder for Amazon MGM Studios.
The American Music Awards host is next scheduled to kick off her 12-date Up All Night Live in Las Vegas residency at Caesars Palace’s The Colosseum on December 30.
Jennifer – whose big break was starring in Gregory Nava’s 1997 Selena biopic – originally got her start in 1991 as a Fly Girl for Fox’s comedy sketch show In Living Color before serving back-up dancer duties for Janet Jackson in 1993.