There are a lot of questions surrounding Jennifer Lopez in regards to both her career and her marriage to Ben Affleck. After selling her $60 million mansion amid rumors that she and her husband of two years are on the rocks, the singer canceled her world tour, and her recent Netflix movie Atlas was not well-received by critics. Drastic times call for drastic measures, as they say, and producer Jon Peters thinks he’s got the answer to save JLo’s career — and it involves a move to Nashville.
Jon Peters, who produced Jennifer Lopez’s 1995 movie Money Train, thinks the multihyphenate should take her talents to Tennessee and follow in the footsteps of Beyoncé by releasing a country music album. He details his plans to TMZ in the new documentary JLo & Ben: Missed Warning Signs (available to stream with a Hulu subscription), saying:
Her career needs to change. I told Benny Medina, her manager, she needs to sell everything, get a rented house, get a beautiful house, and move to Nashville and do a country and western album. You’ll be a monster, you'll get every young guy, Shania Twain, you’ll do the Grand Ole Opry. And I said, ‘And I’ll fund it. Don’t need a record company, I’ll put up money. We’ll own it. She’ll go out there, bang.’
The movie producer seems pretty convinced his plan could work — so much so that he apparently told Benny Medina that he’d be willing to put money toward the venture.
It would certainly be unexpected for “Jenny from the Block” to forgo her Latina-pop roots for something a little twangier, but she certainly wouldn’t be the first musician to pivot in that direction. Ed Sheeran and Zayn Malik have drawn inspiration from the genre recently, and as previously mentioned, Beyoncé made waves this year with the release of Cowboy Carter. Post Malone, as well, has been dabbling in country with his hit collab with Morgan Wallen “I Had Some Help,” and he has a duet with Blake Shelton dropping June 21.
Now, if JLo would be open to such a career move is another question entirely, and it’s hard to gauge what we should even believe with all the rumors circulating about her relationship with Ben Affleck. After taking their time to find what seemed to be the perfect home for them and their respective children, it was reported that Jennifer Lopez and the Gone Girl star were living in separate homes, and they ultimately lost money in choosing to put their large estate back on the market.
Adding even more fuel to the breakup fire, Jennifer Lopez announced the cancellation of her This Is Me… Live world tour in order to take “time off to be with her children, family and close friends.” At least one PR expert, however, thinks the divorce rumors may be a way of diverting attention from professional setbacks like, for example, poor concert ticket sales or negative movie reviews.
We’ll have to wait and see what happens to Bennifer 2.0 and if JLo chooses to entertain the idea of becoming a country and western artist. In the meantime, you can check out the full Hulu documentary JLo & Ben: Missed Warning Signs or see her newest project Atlas with a Netflix subscription. You can also find her visual album This Is Me… Now: A Love Story on Amazon Prime Video, which is another one of the best streaming services available.
