Jennifer Lopez's The Boy Next Door Allegations, Explained
Jennifer Lopez is happily coupled up with Oscar winner Ben Affleck these days, but apparently, she once "forced" a co-star in a romance thriller to pretend they were dating in real life. According to Melanie Iglesias — an actor and model who once dated actor Ryan Guzman — the multi-hyphenate forced Guzman into situations where they looked like a real couple after they worked on the film "The Boy Next Door" together in 2015.
During an appearance on the "No Chaser" podcast, Iglesias said of Lopez, "She made my ex, oh my God, pretend that he was single to promote the movie." She also said that multiple PR people contacted her to confirm that it was all an act: "The publicists, both of them, called me ... so they were at afterparties together, like, holding hands and stuff to promote this."
A report that ran about the story in Page Six makes it clear that Iglesias didn't specifically name Guzman, but that the two were romantically linked while Guzman worked on "The Boy Next Door." The story frankly gets even stranger when Iglesias brings up an interview that Lopez did with former talk-show host Ellen Degeneres, where Lopez feigned ignorance about Guzman's romantic life.
Melanie Iglesias says that Jennifer Lopez knew Ryan Guzman had a girlfriend — because they met
During her press tour for "The Boy Next Door," Jennifer Lopez sat down with now-disgraced talk show maven Ellen Degeneres to discuss the film; Degeneres, somewhat known for asking very personal questions, asked if there was anything "going on" between her and Ryan Guzman. While Lopez denied it, Degeneres also asked if Guzman had a girlfriend during filming. "I think he might? I'm not sure. I know he did.... I'm not in his business like that," Lopez said at the time while also refusing to rule out that the two could eventually experience a romantic spark.
Meanwhile, Melanie Iglesias said, during her appearance on "No Chaser," that she's actually met Lopez before — and that their meeting was entirely weird. "What do you mean you don't know if he had a girlfriend? We met," Iglesias claimed. "You squeezed the s**t out of my hand. I'm still black and blue."
Regarding their brief meeting, Iglesias alleged that the two met at an awards show and Lopez squeezed her hand very tightly to the point where it caused actual pain. "She met me, and she looked me up and down, and she gave me the hardest, firmest handshake in the world," Iglesias recalled. "I was like, 'Ow! I'll have my hand back, Jesus.'"
Both Jennifer Lopez and Ryan Guzman have moved on from their alleged fake fling
At this point, both Ryan Guzman and Jennifer Lopez seem to be just fine — and nobody is coercing anybody into fake romances on red carpets anymore. Lopez, who famously first dated and agreed to marry Ben Affleck in the early 2000s, spent years in relationships with other men before rekindling things with Affleck (who, for his part, was married to actress Jennifer Garner from 2005 to 2018). Affleck and Lopez rekindled their romance in 2021 and were married in 2022, and Lopez recently decided to take to the big screen to spill the details of their love with "This is Me ... Now: A Love Story," her original film for Amazon Prime. The couple also showed off their life together in the documentary "The Greatest Love Story Never Told," which also is available on Amazon Prime.
As for Guzman, the actor appears on the hit procedural "9-1-1" as Edmundo "Eddie" Diaz and split up from his longtime partner Chrysti Ane in 2023; the two share two children. If you want to revisit their collaboration in "The Boy Next Door," it's available to stream on Max now.