Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck married Saturday in a late-night Las Vegas drive-through chapel, capping off a relationship that spanned two decades and featured on many tabloid covers.
On Saturday, July 16, the pair received a marriage license in Clark County, Nevada, according to court papers. Lopez has selected Jennifer Affleck as her married name, according to the records.
Lopez announced their marriage Sunday in her newsletter for fans with the heading “We did it.” Lopez initially made their engagement public in April on the same newsletter, “On the J Lo.”
“We did it.” “Love is beautiful. Love is kind. And it turns out love is patient. Twenty years patient,” wrote Lopez in a message signed Jennifer Lynn Affleck.
“Exactly what we wanted,” she continued. “Last night we flew to Vegas, stood in line for a license with four other couples, all making the same journey to the wedding capital of the world. Behind us two men held hands and held each other. In front of us, a young couple who made the three hour drive from Victorville on their daughter’s second birthday — all of us wanting the same thing — for the world to recognize us as partners and to declare our love to the world through the ancient and nearly universal symbol of marriage.”
Lopez added that they shot photographs outside of the Little White Wedding Chapel, where the event took place around midnight, in a pink Cadillac convertible.
“But in the end it was the best possible wedding we could have imagined,” she said. “One we dreamed of long ago and one made real (in the eyes of the state, Las Vegas, a pink convertible and one another) at very, very long last.”
The good news comes only three months after Lopez and Affleck announced their second engagement. The couple began dating in the early 2000s, gaining the nickname “Bennifer,” and became engaged in 2003. The two actors, who met on the production of the film “Gigli,” divorced in 2004, blaming “excessive media attention.”
Soon after Lopez confirmed that she and her previous fiancé Alex Rodreguiz had ended their five-year engagement, speculations began that Bennifer was back together. In July 2021, Affleck and Lopez made their Instagram relationship official.
The pair chose to keep their relationship considerably more discreet this time around. However, Lopez announced her engagement in April 2022 by posting a video on her fan page showing off a stunning green diamond ring. Lopez also changed her Twitter handle to include a diamond ring emoji.
Lopez revealed further information about the “totally unexpected” proposal, which occurred while she was relaxing in a bubble bath, in a video posted a few days later.
“My love came in, Ben came in, and he got down on one knee and he said some things that I’ll never forget,” she said. “And then he pulled out a ring and said, ‘Will you marry me?’ And it was the most perfect moment.”
Lopez also mentioned that green was her favorite color and a lucky hue for her. (Affleck used a pink stone when he proposed to her in 2003.) Lopez said she was “smiling so big” and crying when Affleck proposed in a tweet that accompanied the video.
“It was nothing fancy at all, but it was the most romantic thing I could’ve ever imagined … just a quiet Saturday night at home, two people promising to always be there for each other,” she wrote. “Two very lucky people. Who got a second chance at true love.”
Lopez is married for the fourth time, having previously married Ojani Noa from 1997 to 1998, Cris Judd from 2001 to 2003, and Marc Anthony from 2004 to 2014. Lopez and Anthony have twins Emme Maribel Muiz and Maximilian David Muiz, all 14 years old.
Affleck is married for the second time, having previously married Jennifer Garner from 2005 to 2018. Violet, 16, Seraphina, 13, and Samuel, 10, are their three children.
“They were right when they said, ‘all you need is love,'” Lopez said in her shared statement. “We are so grateful to have that in abundance, a new wonderful family of five amazing children and a life that we have never had more reason to look forward to. Stick around long enough and maybe you’ll find the best moment of your life in a drive through in Las Vegas at twelve thirty in the morning in the tunnel of love drive through, with your kids and the one you’ll spend forever with.”
“Love is a great thing, maybe the best of things-and worth waiting for,” she concluded before signing the note as “Mrs. Jennifer Lynn Affleck.”