Part of Musicians Who Act featuring Lady Gaga, Will Smith, Ice Cube, Justin Timberlake, and Frank Sinatra.
Rise to Fame
She got her start as a Fly Girl dancer on In Living Color after the original winner couldn't show up. The real shift came when she outlasted 21,000 other people auditioning for the lead in Selena (1997). That role made her the first Latina actress to earn $1 million for a film, and the work she put into embodying Selena Quintanilla's stage presence gave Lopez a blueprint she took straight into her own music career.
In the Spotlight
The Ben Affleck reunion was always going to make good headlines. The divorce did too. She cancelled her arena tour in May 2024, filed in August on their second wedding anniversary, and went quiet. The fragrance empire she's been building since 2002 kept running without her, crossing $2 billion in global sales across 33 perfumes. By March 2026 she was back at Caesars Palace with a Las Vegas residency, telling Good Morning America she was 'in her happy era.'
Side Notes
She named her debut album On the 6 after the subway line she rode from Castle Hill in the Bronx into Manhattan. Her parents moved from Puerto Rico and pushed her into dance and theater specifically to keep her off the neighborhood streets. The biggest early influence she credits is Rita Moreno in West Side Story, which makes sense once you know she was working at a law office at 18 before she decided to commit to dance full-time.