Jennifer Lopez Facts: 20 Things to Know About J.Lo

Early life in the Bronx

• She grew up in the Castle Hill area of the Bronx with two sisters, Leslie and Lynda.
• Her parents, David and Guadalupe, were both born in Puerto Rico.
• She took singing and dance lessons from childhood and briefly attended Baruch College before leaving to pursue dance.
• Her debut album On the 6 (1999) is named after the 6 train she rode from the Bronx to Manhattan.

From backup dancer to film star

• In 1991 she became a Fly Girl dancer on the sketch comedy show In Living Color.
• She was a backup dancer for Janet Jackson in the early 1990s.
• Her breakout came as Selena Quintanilla in Selena (1997), which earned her a Golden Globe nomination.
• She starred opposite George Clooney in Out of Sight (1998), still one of her best-reviewed films.
• Her role as Ramona in Hustlers (2019) earned Golden Globe and SAG nominations.

Music records and firsts

• In January 2001 she became the first woman to have a No. 1 album (J.Lo) and a No. 1 film (The Wedding Planner) in the US in the same week.
• Her debut single If You Had My Love reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1999.
• Jenny from the Block (2002) became her signature song about staying true to her roots.
• She received the MTV Video Vanguard Award in 2018.
• Her first Las Vegas residency, All I Have, ran from 2016 to 2018.

Pop culture moments

• Former Google chief Eric Schmidt wrote that searches for her green Versace dress at the 2000 Grammys helped inspire Google Image Search.
• She co-headlined the Super Bowl LIV halftime show with Shakira in February 2020.
• She performed at the US presidential inauguration in January 2021.
• She was a judge on American Idol across several seasons starting in 2011.

Business and family

• Her first fragrance, Glow by J.Lo, launched in 2002, and she founded JLo Beauty skincare in 2021.
• She has twins, Max and Emme, born in 2008, with singer Marc Anthony.

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