Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck Married Two Years Ago: Read PEOPLE's Cover Story About Their Las Vegas Wedding

Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez surprised fans when they got married in Las Vegas two years ago, just three months after the Oscar winner proposed to the "Waiting for Tonight" singer at home. As the pair navigate a new chapter in their marriage and spend time apart, read how PEOPLE covered their elopement.

Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez’s romantic July 16 evening could have been a scene straight from one of her blockbuster rom-coms: a deliriously-in-love couple steal away to Las Vegas to elope. 

Arriving at the county clerk’s office a little after 11 p.m., they quietly “smooch,” according to an eyewitness, while waiting in line for a wedding license with four other couples. 

Then the groom and bride-to-be rush to A Little White Wedding Chapel, the renowned spot where stars such as Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward once tied the knot. The suspense builds: Will they make it down the aisle before the chapel closes at midnight?

As luck would have it, the chapel stays open late for the pair, who primp on the premises: Wearing a white dinner jacket from his own closet, he gets ready in the graffitied men’s room; she, in an elegant Zuhair Murad gown, does her own makeup in another lounge. 

They pose for photos in a pink Cadillac convertible before a short walk down the aisle, as “Here Comes the Bride” plays on a Bluetooth speaker. 

They exchange self-penned vows and simple wedding bands. There are smiles, a few happy tears and finally a grand kiss to seal the deal.

If this were a movie, the music would swell and the credits would roll. But for Lopez and Affleck it’s a real-life happy ending—capping the long-awaited sequel to a love story that began more than 20 years ago. 

The pair famously first fell for each other after they met on the set of the movie Gigli in 2001, got engaged before splitting in 2004, then rekindled their romance in 2021. 

“We did it. Love is beautiful. Love is kind. And it turns out love is patient. Twenty years patient,” Lopez wrote to fans in her July 17 On the JLo newsletter, sharing some sweet details and snapshots of her big day. 

“Stick around long enough and maybe you’ll find the best moment of your life in a drive through in Las Vegas at twelve thirty in the morning … Love is a great thing, maybe the best of things—and worth waiting for,” continued Lopez, who signed the note “Mrs. Jennifer Lynn Affleck,” a name change she also requested on their marriage license.

"It was beautiful. Some tears were shed by them both,” chapel coordinator Kenosha Booth tells People. “Jennifer looked stunning.”

The Vegas ceremony—which came just three months after the Argo Oscar winner proposed to the powerhouse singer and actress with a green diamond ring while she was taking a bubble bath at home—surprised many fans. But it was exactly the experience the couple had hoped for.

“They wanted it to be very simple,” a chapel source tells PEOPLE of their wedding. “They were very excited.”