Ben Affleck has broken his silence on Jennifer Lopez’s Hollywood standing with a candid assessment of her overlooked talents.
The “Gone Girl” actor, 54, sat down with Variety on Wednesday and weighed in on why the “Waiting for Tonight” singer, 57, fails to get her due from the industry. “I’m biased. I have an enormous amount of respect and admiration for what she can do,” Affleck said in the interview.
Affleck, who served as a producer on Lopez’s upcoming film “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” didn’t hold back on his skepticism about awards season mechanics. “What I’ve found with awards is that sometimes the degree of commercial success for things doesn’t always correlate to my taste,” he added.
The two-time Oscar winner kept going. “It’s a part of this weird, subjective business that people bring a lot of their own stuff to.”
He even took a swipe at the entire prize-giving enterprise. “But guess what? I don’t think you die and go to heaven and God says, ‘This was the actual best picture in 1986,'” Affleck shared. “At the end of the day, it’s just a bunch of people voting on movie prizes.”
The “Good Will Hunting” star said he doesn’t “always think the right person” wins “the right award.”
Affleck’s comments mark a rare moment of public warmth toward Lopez since their high-profile split. The “Gigli” co-stars tied the knot in July 2022 after rekindling their early-2000s romance, but Lopez filed for divorce in August 2024. They settled the proceedings in January 2025.
Despite the breakup, the pair have maintained cordial relations and have been spotted together at several public outings.
The Variety conversation also found Affleck praising both Lopez and his first ex-wife, Jennifer Garner, for their business savvy in the social media age. “Artists should be making money. You see it massively in the music business. People — either tacitly or explicitly — are expected to make money elsewhere,” he said.
“Now you’ve got your social media identity. You work to develop that. I’ve seen both Jennifer Lopez and Jennifer Garner do amazing jobs cultivating and accruing value in those spaces,” Affleck continued.
He admitted his own limitations in that arena. “Don’t think that’s not real work. I couldn’t do it. What am I going to do, unbox something?”
Affleck’s remarks arrive as Lopez continues building momentum for “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” the musical drama that brought her back together with her former husband behind the camera.