Jennifer Lopez Talks Navigating ‘Challenging Relationships’ as a Mom

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Jennifer Lopez Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic

Jennifer Lopez opened up about navigating “challenging relationships” as a mother amid her ongoing divorce from estranged husband Ben Affleck.

Lopez, 55, attended a Tuesday, November 5, screening in London for her new movie Unstoppable, as reported by Hello! Magazine, which is set to hit theaters on December 6. During a Q&A after the screening, the singer spoke about her character Judy Robles’ “struggle” and what she found “very relatable” about women focused on “being a mother” while also dealing with “challenging relationships.”

In Unstoppable, Lopez portrays Robles, a real-life woman and mother of former NCAA wrestling champion Anthony Robles who raised her children while dealing with both financial insecurity and an abusive relationship.

“I think a lot of women have gone through that, and [Judy] and I talked a lot,” Lopez said, noting that she wanted Judy to “really feel safe with me [while] sharing details” about her life.

“When you talk to Judy’s kids, including Anthony, they’re like, ‘My mom’s so positive, she’s so great,’” Lopez continued. “There was a whole different story there that she was living, that you hide from your children, you protect your children from that.”

Lopez is a mother herself, sharing 16-year-old twins Max and Emme with her ex-husband Marc Anthony.

Lopez added that she didn’t want to “just play the mom who the kids knew, but to play the woman who raised these children and how she found her own strength.” She also noted that she didn’t want “anybody to see me in [the role]. I wanted them to see Judy in it.”

Unstoppable is produced by Affleck, 52, as part of Artists Equity production company, which he co-founded with his best friend Matt Damon. Affleck praised his estranged wife’s performance earlier this month during an interview with Entertainment Tonight, saying, “Jennifer is spectacular.”

Lopez responded to this praise in kind on Monday, November 5, during the film’s U.K. premiere, telling reporters, “I would describe all of the cast and everybody behind the scenes as spectacular and wonderful.”

Affleck and Lopez’s praise for each other comes months after the “Jenny From the Block” singer filed for divorce from Affleck after two years of marriage. Rather than go through a lawyer, Lopez filed the paperwork herself at a court in Los Angeles on August 20, with their date of separation listed as April 26, three months before the pair would have celebrated their second wedding anniversary.

“I think my whole life I’ve just been trying to say I’m good enough, until where I am now, when I know. I’m giving myself credit. I’m telling that little girl that grew up in the Bronx, ‘You’ve done really good for yourself.’ I didn’t do that for so many years,” Lopez told Nikki Glaser in a conversation for Interview magazine published on Wednesday, October 9. “And now I think, with everything that’s happened in my life and in my relationships and even in my career, it’s like, give yourself a bit of comfort and love. We’ve been through a lot of things that nobody knows about, and you’ve persevered and you refuse to give up and to let it get you down.”

She added: “There’s something to be said for that because things can really change your life in a way that you do want to give up and say, ‘F— this, this is too hard, I don’t want to do this anymore.’ But I’m not there. I refuse to not give myself everything that little girl deserves.”

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