EXCLUSIVE: Jennifer Lopez and Josh Duhamel Talk Their New Movie, Shotgun Wedding
Jennifer Lopez and Josh Duhamel lead Prime Video’s new rom com, Shotgun Wedding. We got the chance to hear from the stars regarding what drew them to the movie, inviting an ex to their weddings, and so much more. Check out what they had to say below.
What drew you to wanting to be a part of this movie?
Josh Duhamel: “What I love about the movie and what I think Jason Moore did such a great job on is, he wasn’t afraid to make this a big romp of a movie. We went there and we knew it on the day, and this felt different from anything I’ve done, and that’s what I loved about it. He always talked about squeezing a little lemon on that sugar, so I thought that this movie felt tonally, comedically different than anything I’ve done.”
Lopez: “It’s a big romantic comedy, but it’s more of a romantic kind of action movie. It’s an adventure. There’s so much that happens. But the core of it is, it’s about these families coming together and Darcy and Josh’s character, Tom, really figuring out who they are and how they’re going to make this marriage work and if they can make this marriage work. Because they start off at very different ends of the spectrum on what they want, not just from this wedding, but from their relationship. But along the way with all of the things that they have to go through, which is outrageous and crazy, and where it goes is crazy, they really do discover each other and what they want.”
You both got married this year. Do you think your father would have invited your ex to your wedding?
Lopez: “My dad, I would like to think wouldn’t do that. But we needed that in the movie, we needed something to happen. Yeah, I don’t think my dad would ever do that, ever.”
Duhamel: “What if it was Lenny Kravitz though?”
Lopez: “No.”
Duhamel: “He’s a pretty cool ex-boyfriend. I have to admit.”
Lopez: “No way. No, my dad is really the quiet, calm dad. He doesn’t ruffle feathers. Now, if you said my mom, then I would be like, oh, maybe.”
Can you talk a little about the wedding dress and the transformation it goes through in the movie?
Lopez: “I really felt like the dress itself was a character in the movie, but also really represented what she was going through. So I wanted it to start off where she was super uncomfortable. It was the biggest, most cumbersome, kind of beautiful, but also not her at all. And then as she went on and was more honest with Josh about who she was and what she wanted and started kind of peeling back the layers and becoming more herself and stepping into her own power more of her authenticity. And I think that happened with the dress as well as pieces started coming off. And by the end, she’s this badass, and she’s taken off the hair extensions and she has a gun. And she’s like, all right, now everybody listen to me.”
Duhamel: “This is the wedding that I wanted.”
Lopez: “This is how it’s going to be from now on. Everybody’s going to behave themselves, enough of this. We had it basically in stages throughout the whole entire thing, and it’ll look like this, then this part piece will come off, then this one, and then when she does, I say this, this will happen. And it was very kind of calculated, for sure.”
Do you have a particular scene where you made each other break?
Duhamel: “I remember the time when I called you, your hair to square. You looked like a Simpson. She broke, I remember that.
Lopez: “Oh yeah. We had this very emotional scene where I was like, ‘All our family could die. Blah, blah, blah.’ He’s like, ‘Your head looks like a square, you look like Simpson.’ I was like, ‘What?'”
Duhamel: “What are you supposed… She was accusing me of buying jeans from the ladies’ department.”
Shotgun Wedding will be released to Prime Video on January 27.
*This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Photo credit: Ana Carballosa/Lionsgate