“As a mom, you always want to put your best foot forward for your kids,” Lopez, 55, told British Vogue in an interview published Friday, December 20. “You want to lift them up. But that doesn’t stop you from being a human being who struggles.”
Lopez shares 16-year-old twins Max and Emme with ex-husband Marc Anthony.
In her new film Unstoppable, Lopez plays the mother of Anthony Robles, a wrestler who was born with one leg and won a 2011 national championship.
Lopez said she connected with Judy Robles’ real-life story of wanting to be the best parent possible even while facing hardships.
“Being a mom and knowing what it is to want to give the best to your children and put forward your best face for them all the time, but also be struggling as a woman in relationships and in life with your own dreams and your own aspirations and what that means and that feels like,” Lopez explained, “I think for me, was the biggest thing.”
Later on in their interview, Lopez said she felt “very deeply” about Judy’s marriage hardships because she’s “been in the same spot at times.” (Judy divorced her husband after 20 years of marriage.)
“Maybe I shouldn’t be giving this person a chance, you know what I mean? Maybe I should end this right now and go back,” Lopez explained. “I don’t think there’s a woman on Earth who hasn’t been in that position — or even men!”
Anthony, 56, and Lopez separated in 2011 after nearly seven years of marriage. Their divorce was ultimately finalized in 2014.
“When my marriage ended, it was not easy to find forgiveness,” Lopez told W in May 2016. “It wasn’t the dream that I had hoped for, and it would have been easier to fan the flames of resentment, disappointment and anger. But Marc is the father of my children, and that’s never going away. So I have to work to make things right. And that is, by far, the hardest work I do.”
More recently, Lopez ended her two-year marriage to Ben Affleck in August 2024. He has since called her performance in Unstoppable “spectacular.” (Affleck’s production company, Artists Equity, produced the sports drama.)
Moving forward, Lopez said she wants to give herself more credit for what she has been through in her personal and professional life.
“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,” she said in an October conversation for Interview magazine. “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.”
Unstoppable is scheduled to debut on Prime Video January 16, 2025.
