Somehow, I never realized that some of Jennifer Lopez’s best rom-coms, like Maid in Manhattan and The Wedding Planner, have a trope in common. However, JLo’s newest co-star, Brett Goldstein, has noticed this commonality, and I’m thrilled that he chose not to go along with it for their project on Netflix’s 2026 schedule, Office Romance.
The trope in question is the fact that JLo’s characters are often people who aren’t of high social or financial status who are aspiring to something bigger. Brett Goldstein aptly pointed this out during his interview on Late Night with Seth Meyers, saying:
If you’ve seen all her rom-coms, which I have, she’s always low status and aspiring to something and sort of on the outskirts of things. And we wanted to do a more grown-up one that I hadn’t seen her do before. So, she’s the CEO in this one; she has it all, and she’s very good at her job. It was like a love letter to workaholics, that was what it was.
Now that I think about it, he’s totally right. As the title implies, Maid in Manhattan centers around a maid played by JLo who runs into a rising politician at a fancy hotel. He assumes she’s a guest, and the film unfolds from there.
In The Wedding Planner, Lopez plays a woman who is trying really hard to work up to a new position at her company. After she’s saved from an accident, she realizes the man who saved her (whom she’s crushing on) is her client’s fiancé. So, while she’s not necessarily “low status,” she’s certainly “aspiring to something” in this one.
The 2018 movie Second Act, which you can stream with a Hulu subscription, sees Lopez play a retail worker who jumps at the opportunity to reinvent herself in a very high-powered job.
So, even though all her rom-coms don’t use this trope, quite a few of them do, which creates a bit of a trend. However, Office Romance has not followed it. In this rom-com, which you’ll be able to stream with a Netflix subscription on June 5, JLo plays Jackie Cruz, the CEO and president of Air Cruz.
As the trailer for Office Romance shows, Lopez’s character is an absolute boss, and she lives a life of luxury. There’s no working up to a new position or a rags-to-riches tale here; she’s simply rich and wildly successful.
Then, the romance centers around her character and a lawyer who is played by Brett Goldstein falling for each other as they work together, hence the title, Office Romance.
While this film does have familiar elements that we know and love in JLo rom-coms, like an ensemble cast, it’s also quite different from the ones she’s best known for. And I love that Goldstein, who wrote this part specifically for Jennifer Lopez, made this intentional choice.
Now, to see this new rom-com from Jennifer Lopez that is quite different from the ones we know and love her for, you can stream Office Romance on Netflix on Friday, June 5. In the meantime, I’ll be going back to some of her classics, because while I love that this new movie doesn’t follow the trope Goldstein pointed out, it is a great trope nonetheless that I love to watch JLo play.
