How Ben Affleck helped Jennifer Lopez behind the scenes of her new film ‘Atlas’

Her new film Atlas may not be a traditional rom-com, but in it, Jennifer Lopez plays a woman with trust issues who learns to love again. Or, at least, learns not to hate artificial intelligence after a rogue robot (Simu Liu) goes off the rails and tries to end humanity. That old rom-com trope.

But to make that emotional leap, Lopez had a little help from a familiar voice, noted husband and Dunkin’ aficionado Ben Affleck.

Lopez plays Atlas Shepherd, a brilliant but misanthropic data analyst with a deep distrust of artificial intelligence, who joins a mission to capture a renegade robot with whom she shares, according to the logline, a “mysterious past.”

Okay, so maybe this is more of a rom-com than previously thought. But, turns out, the only way to save the world from a renegade AI… is to trust one. Enter Smith, voiced by Gregory James Cohan, with a special assist from Affleck, says Lopez’s costar, Sterling K. Brown.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Brown spilled a little tea from the set of the Netflix film directed by Brad Peyton, out today.

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“Every once in a while, Ben would read the lines for Smith,” the American Fiction star told Entertainment Weekly. “And I think the newlyweds, still very much in love, I think she just wanted to hear his voice. And so sometimes, the reactions that you got from her were because she was listening to her husband’s voice.”

Affleck and Lopez have been helping with each other’s projects since tying the knot in July 2022, albeit in a far more discrete way than, say Gigli. Lopez helped Affleck tune into the world of ’90s fashion for his hit film Air, while a nearly unrecognizable Affleck played a cable news pundit named Rex Stone in Lopez’s self-funded J.Lo-lapalooza, This Is Me…Now: A Love Story.

And then there’s their ongoing Dunkin’ commercial series, which, like their love, will hopefully never end.

Meanwhile, the dystopian sci-fi parable genre is a marked departure for Lopez, as well as the always affable Liu, who plays his first villain, the murderous yet hot AI, Harlan. Initially, when he got the call for the movie, the Barbie star also had a different idea of a J.Lo film.

“Imagine getting a call from your agent. ‘We want you to be in a movie with J.Lo.’ What’s the kind of movie that appears in your mind? A rom-com! Maid in Manhattan! Like, yes. Sign me up, please!” Liu recalled on an episode of Live With Kelly and Mark. “They’re like, ‘You’re trying to kill J.Lo.’ I was like, hold on a second; what do you mean I’m trying to kill J.Lo? That’s the last thing I want to do.”

Yet do it he must. But J.Lo’s not going down without a fight. And maybe, just maybe, she’ll learn to love again. Atlas hits Netflix on May 24.