Ben Affleck is breaking his silence about his split from Jennifer Lopez to clear up some rumors about what led to their divorce.
Affleck, 52, spoke out in an interview with GQ published Tuesday, March 25, where he was asked about why he chose to be involved in Lopez’s 2024 documentary, The Greatest Love Story Never Told. The film was a companion piece to her 2024 visual album, This Is Me … Now, and included scenes where Affleck discussed their relationship.
“Part of it was, ‘OK, if I’m going to participate in this, I want to try to do it in an honest way and in a way that’s interesting,’” he explained. “Because I thought it was an interesting examination.”
The actor praised Lopez, 55, for being someone who “handled celebrity more adeptly and more adroitly than I have.”
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“My temperament is to be a little bit more reserved and private than hers,” he admitted. “As happens in relationships, you don’t always have the same attitude towards these things. And so I thought, ‘Oh, this is interesting because how do you reconcile that?’ Because … I love and support this person. I believe in them. They’re great. I want people to see that.”
Affleck recalled his initial reaction to appearing in the doc, adding, “You don’t marry a ship captain and then say, ‘Well, I don’t like going out in the water.’ You’ve got to own what you knew going into any relationship.”
Later in the interview, Affleck said it was “important to say” that there wasn’t “some major fracture” in his and Lopez’s marriage.
“It’s not like you can watch that documentary and go, ‘Oh, now I understand the issues that these two had,’” he said before explaining why he doesn’t mind talking about his personal life “a little” bit. “As long as my actual feelings and intentions and beliefs are communicated, which I hope I was clear that really [Jennifer] is somebody I have a lot of respect for.”
Affleck noted that he understands “wanting to divine or explore the kind of differences in perspective that we have in terms of how a person feels comfortable approaching the line between public and private life.” Despite that, he has “nothing but respect” for his ex.
“There’s a tendency to look at breakups and want to identify root causes or something. But honestly … the truth is much more quotidian than probably people would believe or would be interesting,” he continued. “There’s no scandal, no soap opera, no intrigue [about our divorce]. The truth is, when you talk to somebody, ‘Hey, what happened?’ Well, there is no, ‘This is what happened.’”
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He concluded: “It’s just a story about people trying to figure out their lives and relationships in ways that we all sort of normally do.”
Affleck and Lopez were previously engaged from 2002 to 2004. They reunited in 2021 but ultimately called it quits three years later. News of the pair’s split came after months of speculation about Affleck and Lopez’s relationship, and their divorce was finalized in January.
“She was very in love with Ben, but love isn’t enough sometimes,” a source told Us Weekly about Lopez in the wake of the duo’s divorce settlement. “Things worked out for the best and how they were supposed to.”
Lopez, who shares 17-year-old twins Max and Emme with ex-husband Marc Anthony, is “having fun” while she’s “working on some big movie projects and enjoying showing how amazing she looks,” the insider added. She is also “enjoying being single and is feeling herself.”
