During her hosting duties hosting at the DNC on Wednesday, Mindy Kaling sent a message to Ben Affleck amid his divorce from Jennifer Lopez.
The Mindy Project alum saw her moment to show her support for the actor while giving a shoutout to the “amazing” delegation from her home state: “I love you Massachusetts; everyone is always hating on us but they just don’t get it!” she remarked.
After naming some of her favorite things from the state, including the Red Sox and NBA star Jayson Tatum, Kaling said, “Ben Affleck, hang in there!” She added that Dunkin’ Donuts, the Massachusetts-born chain that happens to be Affleck’s favorite, is “the best coffee in the world.”
“Ben Affleck, hang in there!”
— Mindy Kaling gives her fellow Massachusetts-native some words of encouragement while she shouts out the state’s delegation pic.twitter.com/JukE3OIv2b
— The Recount (@therecount) August 22, 2024
Kaling’s comment came a day after Lopez filed for divorce from the actor on their two-year wedding anniversary. The multihyphenate listed her separation date from Affleck as April 26, seemingly confirming rumors that the couple had split in the spring.
Fans noticed something was amiss after Lopez attended the premiere of her Netflix movie Atlas solo and was not accompanied by Affleck at the Met Gala while serving as co-chair. The former couple also listed their Beverly Hills home in June, with reports of Affleck moving into a temporary place in Brentwood.
Affleck and Lopez rekindled their romance in 2021, nearly two decades after ending their engagement in 2024. Within a year of dating again, they got married in a surprise, intimate ceremony in Las Vegas. While the couple assured in various interviews that they were blissfully in love, there were hints of friction in their marriage.
In Lopez’s Amazon Prime documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told, Affleck admitted he didn’t feel comfortable having the spotlight on their relationship. “Getting back together, I said, ‘Listen, one of the things I don’t want is a relationship on social media,’” said Affleck. “Then I sort of realized it’s not a fair thing to ask. It’s sort of like, you’re gonna marry a boat captain and you go, ‘Well, I don’t like the water.’”
Lopez noted that despite Affleck voicing his discomfort at her writing about their love life in her latest album, This Is Me … Now, she had no plans to change her approach to her craft. “He loves me, he knows I’m an artist, and he’s gonna support me in every way he can, because he knows you can’t stop me from making the music I made,” she said. ”He doesn’t want to stop me. But that doesn’t mean he’s comfortable being the muse.”
Early in her career, Kaling co-wrote the 2003-2004 off-Broadway play Matt and Ben, a satire about how Affleck and Matt Damon wrote the script for Good Will Hunting, and starred as Affleck in the production.
