noooo
By Danielle Cohen, a writer for the Cut who covers pop-culture news and entertainment. Previously, she wrote about wellness, fitness, and their intersection with culture at GQ.
Photo: Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for ELLE
J.Lo and Ben Affleck have a habit of setting off breakup rumors. When you reunite 18 years after calling off a highly publicized engagement, tabloids are bound to pounce on every tense moment. It doesn’t help that Ben tends to walk around with a severe case of resting divorce face.
So naturally, an alarming number of tabloids are currently confident that the early aughts’ most over-the-top couple is hurtling toward divorce. I am upset, sad, and stressed about the logistics of their Dunkin’ endorsem*nt deal. I’m also not entirely convinced — although a new photo of Affleck speeding away from a Brentwood residence where TMZ claims he’s been staying solo, cigarette in hand, is not doing much to buoy my spirits. Here’s the evidence that’s been offered up.
An unusually chatty source apparently told In Touch they’ve called it quits.
On Wednesday, In Touch claimed to have heard from an “insider” that “the writing is on the wall” for Bennifer — “it’s over.” The tabloid’s source claimed that “they waited almost two decades to get back together, but in the end, they just couldn’t make it work.” Per the chatty insider, Affleck has already moved out of their house, abandoning their 17 bathrooms to “focus on his work and his kids.” The bottom line? “They’ll never stop loving each other, but she can’t control him, and he can’t change her. There’s no way it could have lasted.”
They haven’t been seen together in a while.
The Daily Mail seems to buy the theory that Bennifer isn’t living together anymore. Apparently, they haven’t been seen in public side by side in some time — seven weeks, to be exact. They were last spotted in Dumbo toward the end of March, when Affleck thoughtfully stroked his wife’s butt in front of a horde of cameras. During that trip, they toured a smattering of Upper East Side townhouses, hinting they might want to add several thousand more square feet to their luxury-real-estate portfolio. But since then, they’ve only popped up separately —Affleck participated in Netflix’s live Tom Brady roast in L.A., and J.Lo co-hosted the Met Gala the following night without him (though to be fair, a whole bunch of Met Gala boyfriends were MIA). Since then, both have been seen wandering around L.A. solo (though with their wedding rings), including yet another house-hunting mission in Beverly Hills that J.Lo appeared to handle alone. The Daily Mail was quick to connect the dots and assume J.Lo was shopping for herself, but given the size of these places, who’s to say.
Meanwhile, TMZ claims Affleck is staying in Brentwood now and swears this is a real-life photograph of him speeding away from said residence.
Affleck’s most recent appearance raised some questions.
Speaking of the Tom Brady roast, Affleck delivered a deeply weird six-minute monologue during the show, which involved calling anyone who criticizes Brady on social media “a bitch” before concluding, “I’m probably never going to work again, actually, after tonight.” The appearance prompted speculation that something was going on in his personal life. Which, again, is hard to determine, since all recent sightings indicate he is at his normal, everyday level of being fed up.
A handful of tabloids analyzing In Touch’s “insider” info have cited J.Lo’s February documentary as an example of the couple’s tension. In the movie, Affleck talked about not wanting to have such a publicized relationship and admitted he and his wife were “trying to learn to compromise” when it came to social media. The documentary also saw J.Lo showing a whole bunch of people private love letters that he wrote to her, a choice he didn’t seem too pleased with.
On the other hand, maybe they’re fine?
Still, my main takeaway from J.Lo’s documentary was that, actually, these two were making it work despite being diametrically opposed on basically everything. Affleck likened his desire for a private relationship with a global superstar to “marrying a boat captain” and saying, “Well, I don’t like the water” — and meanwhile, J.Lo told the cameras of his involvement in her career, “What he saw in me, what he made me believe about myself, only comes from love.” Plus, the past few months have been filled with plenty of hand-holding, romantic outings, and, of course, the aforementioned butt grab. I don’t know about you, but when I look at this couple, I still see a couple of yacht-loving, over-caffeinated A-listers in love. I’ll believe a divorce when I see it!
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