Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Lopez, both undaunted by the online chatter, shared their resilience during a recent roundtable interview with Emily Blunt, Tessa Thompson, Elle Fanning, and Sydney Sweeney.
As the conversation unfolded, Gwyneth revealed her firm stance on avoiding self-related news, stating, "I try to never read anything about myself. Full stop. Ever. Period." Jennifer, intrigued by this revelation, asked, "Wait, not anything about yourself? Ever? Period?"
While Jennifer, 56, admitted to not reading film reviews, she noted that people often bring good or even bad ones to her attention. For Gwyneth, 53, she shared instances where she stumbled upon such articles, prompting the Kiss of the Spider Woman actress to express her desire to "die." Marty Supreme star Elle Fanning echoed this sentiment, stating that she tries to avoid such content and even deleted her Instagram account.
J.Lo shared a similar mindset of periodically "cleansing" herself from negative criticism about her personal life to focus on her work. She explained, "From the very beginning, for whatever reason, I've been a lightning rod for both nice things and a lot of negativity. It's hard because you think to yourself, 'These people don't get me. They don't see me. They don't understand me.' But then suddenly they do and then they don't again."
Despite these challenges, J.Lo reminds herself of her daily accomplishments and the good person she is. She adds, "That has always helped me through."
Both women also discussed the criticism they faced after venturing into new territories in their careers. Gwyneth recalled stepping back into entrepreneurship around 2008, which confused and upset many people. "Nobody understood what I was doing," she said. "I faced a lot of criticism and confusion over the course of the 17 years since I sent out my first Goop newsletter."
J.Lo echoed a similar experience after pursuing a music career following successful films like Selena and Out of Sight. "It was such a big deal," she recounted. "People were like, 'They're never going [to] take you seriously as an actor ever again.'" However, as Gwyneth noted, who was once engaged to Jennifer's ex-husband Ben Affleck, "You had the No. 1 movie and the No. 1 album in the same time, right?"
Indeed, Jennifer topped the musical charts in February 2001 with her album J.Lo and had the number one film at the box office with The Wedding Planner. She noted that she was actually in the Guinness Book of Records. But as she added, "everybody's always trying to tell you: 'You can only do this,' or 'You can only do that.' I had my perfume line. I had my clothing lines. I have my J Lo beauty now. You have to just do what feels good for you."
