- Jennifer Lopez released her new musical film "This Is Me...Now" on Friday via Prime Video.
- Lopez's husband Ben Affleck, who partially inspired the project, has a brief cameo.
Ben Affleck is one of many celebrity guest stars in Jennifer Lopez's new musical film "This Is Me…Now: A Love Story."
The hourlong movie, which premiered Friday on Prime Video, touted Affleck's role in the trailer (among other A-list actors like Jane Fonda and Keke Palmer).
However, you might miss Affleck's cameo entirely if you aren't paying close attention.
The two-time Oscar winner transformed his appearance to play Rex Stone, an alarmist news commentator with blond hair, big teeth, and a Southern accent. (Affleck's distinctive chin, however, remains intact.)
Stone appears early in the film before a dystopian dream sequence in a "heart factory." He warns viewers that everyone has become a "disconnected, survivalist, spiritually mentally broken animal," adding, "We have no love for each other. We have no love for ourselves."
Affleck also appears in a scene with Lopez where they're riding a motorcycle through a dreamy landscape. Affleck is in the driver's seat while Lopez clings from behind, but his face is never shown onscreen.
In a recent interview with Variety, Lopez said she solicited Affleck's advice while making the movie, for which she invested $20 million of her own money.
Affleck advised Lopez to keep the film "really tight," Variety reported. When he saw the final cut, he congratulated his wife on a job well done.
"He said, 'You made a movie. For you. You made a great movie. You did it,'" Lopez said. "Honestly, I don't care what happens now. That is the biggest kind of compliment that I could get."
Affleck and Lopez dated in the early aughts and got engaged in 2002, but broke up in 2003 just three days before their wedding. Two decades later, they rekindled their romance and got married in 2022.
"This Is Me…Now: A Love Story" is a surreal retelling of Lopez's journey in the interim, including her tumultuous dating life.
One scene shows Lopez's character getting married to three different men in identical wedding ceremonies, poking fun at her relentless (and often ill-advised) pursuit of love.
According to director Dave Meyers, Lopez's team was careful to avoid casting men who resembled any of her real exes, a list that includes Sean "Diddy" Combs, Marc Anthony, and Alex Rodriguez.
"It's not about those people. This journey and this movie really is about what she went through as a woman and what she went through as an eternal optimist and a hopeless romantic," Meyers told Business Insider.
"That is the lesson that she feels, and I agree with her, is the most valuable to fans or non-fans," he added. "That's the most important thing that she can offer in her time on this planet to the world."