The Fantasy of Bennifer
You know that feeling when youâre starting to sober up at a house party? The one where you look around at what you thought, just a few minutes ago, was a glam, fun, hangout and, suddenly, it dawns on you⊠Youâre actually in a dingy kitchen, listening to two men discuss the best at-home coffee grinders?
Well, I think, collectively, weâre all experiencing a similar sensation right now. Except about Bennifer 2.0.
Because J.Lo and Ben Affleck are over, right? It certainly seems that way at least. The aughts power couple who rekindled their romance in the pandemic have reportedly sold their multimillion-dollar house and are apparently at breaking point, âclose friendsâ have told the tabloids.
Now that the dust is settling, it all feels a bit like waking up from a weird fever dream, doesnât it? I mean, a few years ago, Iâd have bet my, I donât know, air fryer on the fact that this pair would stay together forever. Affleck massaging Lopezâs bum on a yacht (for the second time!) was all the evidence I needed that happily ever afters were real. It would appear, however, that we all got a little ahead of ourselves. Maybe a glamorous multi-hyphenate, celebrated for her drive, perfume line, and painstakingly maintained bod, was never going to find her perfect match in a scruffy actor, best known in some circles for looking a bit sad when he smokes. (And I donât mean that as a diss, itâs actually my type.) Maybe the whole way their relationship played out wasâŠa little wild?
In case you arenât totally clear on the story, let me clue you in. The pair first met on the set of a very bad film, Gigli, in 2001. By the time the movie had come out, theyâd had a whirlwind romance absolutely chock full of PDA. Lopez wrote a love song called âDear Ben,â in which she declared: âYouâre perfect / I just canât control myself.â (I feel the same about restaurant bread baskets.) Affleck took out full-page ads in trade mags to toast Lopez when she won awards. They got engaged within a yearâAffleck sealing the deal with an extremely Y2K pink diamond. Then they were hounded by the paparazzi to the point that they cancelled their wedding, broke up, and married other people (which doesnât sound at all traumatic).
And that was that, until 2021, whenâboth newly single and, letâs be honest, probably bored in lockdown 3.0âsparks began to fly between our lovebirds again. Maybe some fire emojis were DMed. Perhaps a âstay safeâ was commented. Could a âyou up?â have been texted? (Who didnât shoot a few bold shots in the pandemic?) Whatever the case, the pair were drawn together. They went public in July, did their first red carpet in September, and had been married twice by the end of 2022 (because having just one wedding is for bores). And, all the while, they engaged in the kind of high-level corny behavior most people are only shameless enough to partake in during the infatuation stage, those blissful weeks at the beginning of a relationship when youâre so pheromoned-up you canât see any of your new partnerâs flaws.
We saw Jen joining in with Benâs hobbies (struggling to carry iced coffee) and Ben supporting Jenâs passions (making a semi-fictional movie inspired by their love story starring Keke Palmer and Kim Petras). They declared their obsession for each other in interviews. There was their very public loved-up honeymoon in Paris, the matchy-matchy fits⊠I wouldnât have been surprised if either of them started posting snaps captioned âthis one xxâ on their socials, such were the vibes. Then it turned out that Affleck had kept every picture, email, and letter the two had shared since 2001âall of which he presented to Lopez as a gift. The world was hooked. Sure, it all came across as very intense, but we lapped it up, gorging on the silly romance of it all.
I do wonder why it was that so many of us were so transfixed by this relationship. Normally, when celebrities are PDA-heavy, they are rightfully shamed for it, just like all people should be (Iâm British, in case you hadnât guessed), but with these two, things were different. Was it because it was super nostalgic seeing the duo out together again? Was it that it played into a narrative weâve all bought into, about celebritiesâ lives being ruined by the paparazziâscratching the same itch as Anne Hathaway and fake Harry Styles getting savaged by Buzzfeed (lol) but still coming out on top in very high-quality movie The Idea of You? Maybe.
One of my friends reckons that, as a culture, we all got âcaught in dicksand.â Iâd take things one step further (and I do have to stress here that Iâm basing this on pretty much no factual information). You know the plot of nearly every rom-com? When the lead gives up chasing the hot asshole with the flashy job and realizes that the person she should be with is really her best friend, or her first love or the one that got away? (It was the plot of When Harry Met Sally, 13 Going on 30, even the bloody Lizzie McGuire Movie.) I think that over the years, this ideaâthat our true romantic partner is not a sexy new person, itâs actually a safe person from our pastâhas seeped into some of our brain jelly (a scientific term).
I call this the âit-was-them-all-alongâ theory, and it hits when youâre at your weakest: after youâve had a couple of failed relationships or youâre sick of dating apps or youâre in the middle of a pandemic and youâre worried thereâs a possibility that the whole of the human race might be wiped out. You look back on past flings and old friendships with rose-tinted glasses, ignoring the (usually very good) reasons things didnât work out in the past.
This is my theory for why Bennifer 2.0 happenedâand I also think itâs why we were all such suckers for their love story too.
I mean, who doesnât hope that their life might, at some point, have some rom-com flourish? I donât know a person whoâd happily believe that they might never get another shot at a lost love or fumbled crush. And when youâre single, itâs nice to feel like there might be a potential future for you in actually touching distanceârather than 1,600 swipes, 45 bad dates, and three crushing situationships away. It makes total sense to me that, as they got back together, weâd look at Ben and Jen and ignore all evidence contrary to the idea that this was their tied-up-with-a-pretty-bow ending, or that their credits were about to roll and all that would come next would be some kooky outtakes and a 7/10 Rita Ora song. Because if it could happen for them, it could happen for us.
Of course, it appears not to have happened for them, which is a shame. But at least it gave us all an opportunity to rewatch Affleckâs cameo in âJenny From the Block.â