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Page 1
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Lopez can go home again as long as she doesn't mind crowds, though some question if she really wants to ....
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Page 2
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J. Lo strips down, serenades Ben Affleck, puts it all in an album for her kids ...
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Page 3
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Luther Vandross gets J. Lo in the mood, but it's a Michael Jackson record that makes her say, 'I want this guy' ...
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Photo Gallery
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Jennifer Lopez: Photos From The MTV Interview
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-- by Joe D'Angelo, with additional reporting by Sway Calloway
A black Lincoln Navigator pulls to the curb in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx. Such a vehicle isn't an uncommon sight in this neighborhood in the New York borough home to the Yankees, though when its occupants come into view, jaws drop.
Diane Sawyer's presence doesn't rile the crowd so much as when her travel companion emerges from the SUV. Jennifer Lopez, returning to the area where she grew up, is greeted by screaming fans fervent for autographs and pictures of the homegirl made good. Lopez is taking the ABC newswoman back to her roots — they'll also visit her old home, the Holy Family Catholic school and the local pizza parlor — for a "Primetime" interview set to air Wednesday (November 13).
"Jennifer! Jennifer! Take a picture with me," Lopez recalled hearing fans plead during the recent visit. "It was great. It definitely got crazy."
Although the 32-year-old singer/actress resides in Los Angeles, she'll always call the Bronx home. Whenever she returns there — recently to film "Maid in Manhattan," due December 13, in which she plays a cleaning woman hailing from the borough — the familiarities rush back almost instantly.
"It was great for me because it feels like I never left," she said. "When I get back there and I'm actually standing right there on the tierra (Spanish for 'ground' or 'earth'), it gives you a feeling like you're home."
Her fans treated her like a family member who hasn't been home in a while. Shortly after arriving, the crowd swelled to the point where Lopez had to make a hasty retreat much to their disappointment.
Though she professes her genuine nature on songs like "I'm Real," from J. Lo (2001), and "Jenny From the Block," from This Is Me ... Then (November 26), Lopez has been shackled with a reputation for being a diva with an exorbitant tour rider that includes such demands as an all-white dressing room.
A New York newspaper reporting on the "Primetime" visit alleged that Lopez was less than cordial to the peeps from her past. Accounts of bodyguards shoving fans and bringing one to tears were coupled with personal testimonies that claimed when Jenny left the block, she didn't look back, except when shout-outs to the Boogie Down benefited her street cred.
The same article that blasted her bodyguards quoted Bronx locals who recalled the time Lopez and then-beau P. Diddy visited around Thanksgiving a few years ago and the night she signed autographs at a Holy Family dance marathon in 1996.
She's a member of the Boys and Girls Club of America Alumni Hall of Fame, and never fails to draw attention as one the sexiest stars of both music and movies — not to mention for her high-profile romances to P. Diddy and now Ben Affleck.
It's hard to imagine one woman being so much to so many but, like most of her accomplishments, Lopez finds a way to get it done.
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Photo: Sony
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