She’s everywhere promoting her latest CD, talking about her relationship with a certain Oscar-winning actor, promoting her perfume (Glow), running her restaurant, and now promoting her new movie, Maid in Manhattan, co-starring Ralph Fiennes. If you are at all concerned with pop culture, you cannot escape her; she’s everywhere, a tribute more to her publicist and her own ambition than her actual talents as an actress or singer (at least in my opinion). Lost in all the publicity and hype is the fact that she’s an average singer (at best) and an actress who’s shown potential for greatness (Selena, Out of Sight), but in most of her movies she’s proven to be an equally average screen presence.

In Maid in Manhattan, she top-lines her fifth-straight film following starring roles in The Cell, The Wedding Planner, Angel Eyes, and Enough. While there’s no doubt that J-Lo is a star and possibly a good actress, the fact remains that as a box office draw she’s no Julia, Meg, or Reese, as none of her movies have made more than $61 million at the box office (domestic) and she’s not a potent international draw either. It’s probably not fair to say that she has a lot riding on the release of Maid in Manhattan, as U.S. interest in J-Lo seems insatiable at the moment and she has two movies scheduled for release in 2003 (both with fiancé Ben Affleck). But the release of Maid in Manhattan will prove an interesting test of her ability to open a movie, and whether all the publicity and media domination actually translates into box office dollars.

At first glance, it would appear that she has a hit on her hands with Maid in Manhattan. Public awareness of her as an entertainer has probably never been and probably never will be higher. It’s the only romantic comedy of the Christmas season and the PG-13 rating guarantees that her younger fans will be able see the movie. And the plot is a Cinderella story, quite similar to the Holy Grail of romantic comedies, Pretty Woman. J-Lo was moderately successful in her only other romantic comedy outing, The Wedding Planner, which grossed just over $60 million in the United States. The lack of a strong male co-star in Ralph Fiennes is not necessarily a drawback, especially when you compare it with the success of Reese Witherspoon’s Sweet Home Alabama earlier this year. Advance buzz and early critical reaction seems decidedly mixed, with no raves and no outright pans though it must be stated that her core fans of young teen women is probably not swayed by critical reaction to the movie. I’m not sure critical reaction will be important at all given the lack of other romantic comedies in the market place right now.

So all the ingredients are there for a hit, but something still feels a little off to me. A brief perusal of the initial reviews leads me to believe Maid in Manhattan is an average romantic comedy, a nice way to kill off a couple of hours during the holiday madness. J-Lo’s past box-office track record certainly would lead one to believe that she’s good for $50 - 60 million and maybe $70 million tops, but no more than that. The movie certainly doesn’t look to be the lightening in the bottle that was Pretty Woman and for all her publicity, Lopez doesn’t have the “heat” of Reese Witherspoon who drove Sweet Home Alabama to a $125 million (and counting) domestic gross.

The media seems far more fascinated with her than the average moviegoer, and I think that will keep her from reaching the box-office heights of Reese, Julia, Meg, or even Jodie. J-Lo’s sheer ambition and appetite for stardom is breathtaking. No other female celebrity other than Madonna has so single-mindedly pursued fame and stardom, and one would have to argue that she’s been slightly more successful than Madonna in that regard given her relative success in movies. However, Madonna was a cultural lightening rod who generated attention through controversy and provocation. Nothing about J-Lo is controversial, especially since she's not dating P. Diddy anymore. At this stage J-Lo is famous for being J-Lo, not for being a provocateur or an exceptionally talented artist.

In the end though, I think what will keep J-Lo from being a huge box office draw and Maid in Manhattan from being a huge hit (more than $75 million) on the level of the romantic comedies of Reese, Meg, or Julia is the fact that U.S. audiences like to discover their stars and not have would-be stars crammed down their throats. Moviegoers "discovered" Julia in Pretty Woman, Meg in When Harry Met Sally, and Reese in Legally Blonde (Tom in Risky Business and Brad in Thelma & Louise are just two examples from the masculine perspective of movie stardom).  All three women were in unexpected hits that thrust them into the limelight and on the path to stardom. I think that's why TV stars rarely become huge box-office draws because the element of surprise is lost.