WHERE IS THE LOVE? ON SCREEN, REAL-LIFE LOVERS OFTEN FIZZLE.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Staff Writer

There are a lot of reasons to approach the Ben Affleck/Jennifer Lopez romance ``Gigli'' with trepidation when it opens Friday.

Initial preview screenings elicited disastrous responses from test audiences. The studio took note, recalled the cast and shot another ending, and tested the movie again. Apparently the screening didn't go so well since director Martin Brest and Revolution Studios head Joe Roth left the theater screaming at each other and had to be separated.

``See, we did it your way, we did your Hollywood ending and people hated it!'' Brest shouted at Roth.

Sounds like a winner, huh?

But ``Gigli'' (pronounce it ZHEE-lee) has one thing working in its favor: At least Affleck and Lopez made the movie before they became a couple.

As we've learned from painful past experience, films that feature off- screen couples as on-screen lovers are about as much fun to watch as the two-hour video your neighbors made while visiting Branson, Mo., last summer.

Sure, there have been exceptions - Tracy and Hepburn, Bogie and Bacall come to mind. But that was a long time ago, back when studios were a little more interested in featuring talented actors instead of marketable personalities. These days, we're more likely to be entertained by the sight of Ben and Jen canoodling in Central Park than we are by any movie they make together. The paparazzi photos are more interesting than the product.

``What you're looking for when you're casting are actors that bring out the best in each other, and I'm not sure that you could get that with a married couple,'' says director Steven Soderbergh, who struck gold when he cast Lopez opposite George Clooney in 1998's ``Out of Sight.''

``With George, we looked at a lot of actresses, all the good ones. He had great chemistry with Sandra Bullock, but it wasn't right for an Elmore Leonard movie. What sold me on Jennifer was that George was better with her than he was with anybody else. He was different, and that's what the movie needed.''

Boring bedfellows

What movies don't need is an ingrained sense of familiarity between the leads. Take Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. They met on ``Days of Thunder.'' It's a bad movie, but you can kind of see the attraction forming in their scenes. After they married, they made ``Far and Away'' and ``Eyes Wide Shut'' together, demonstrating so little heat that observers began to wonder about the validity of their marriage.

``The erotic heat goes out the window once the actors become a couple,'' says radio personality Ralph Garman, who covers movies and sex for the top-rated ``Kevin and Bean'' morning show on KROQ-FM in Los Angeles. ``It's art imitating life. When they meet, they have that thrill of discovery and you see it on the screen. But then familiarity sets in and if they try to make a movie together after they've been a couple for a while, they can't re-create that sexual energy. It's not pretty to watch.''

Some off-screen couples don't even generate sparks before they officially hook up. Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger met on ``The Marrying Man'' and later remade ``The Getaway,'' going from bad to worse in the on-screen chemistry department. Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn fell in love while making ``Swing Shift'' and went on to make ``Overboard'' together. Neither movie is remembered by anyone other than their family members.

Two years ago, Russell Crowe and Meg Ryan became famously involved while making ``Proof of Life.'' Curiosity seekers went to theaters, looking for clues of when this torrid love affair took hold. No evidence was found.

Smart couples know better and simply don't work together. Tom Hanks met Rita Wilson on the set of the forgettable 1984 Peace Corps comedy ``Volunteers.'' They married four years later, and though Hanks cast Wilson in a small part in his directorial debut, ``That Thing You Do!,'' he says the two have never been tempted to co-star outside of a couple of small scenes they shared in ``Sleepless in Seattle.''

``For one thing, it would be hard on the family,'' Hanks says. ``But, more importantly, why would you? History isn't exactly on the side of married actors working together, now is it?''

Brad Pitt agrees, recently telling London's Sunday Times Culture magazine, ``You look at the couples who make a film together and it always comes out crap. There's too much baggage. Like the sex scene between Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger in the remake of 'The Getaway.' Put her with anybody else and yeah, I'm paying. I don't know what it is, but it doesn't work.''

Public displays

But that doesn't stop Hollywood couples from trying, sometimes for reasons best left for therapists. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton made a string of movies together after meeting on the set of the epic stinker ``Cleopatra'' in 1963. With the exception of the Oscar-winning ``Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' the movies were terrible, but Liz and Dick kept cranking them out, as if to show the world they were the picture of togetherness. Naturally, they wound up divorced - twice.

Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward haven't gotten divorced, but the success of their 45-year marriage hasn't translated into many memorable movies, either. (Broadway is a different story.) Their first film, ``The Long Hot Summer,'' was their best, but it was followed by forgettable fare like ``From the Terrace,'' ``Paris Blues,'' ``A New Kind of Love'' and ``Winning.'' The films were always better when Newman stayed behind the camera and let Woodward do the heavy lifting on her own.

There's a rumor that Affleck wants to direct Lopez someday, too, provided they stay together long enough to find the suitable property. There's an even more frightening rumor that the two were approached to remake ``Casablanca.'' The high-profile couple already have another film in the can, Kevin Smith's autobiographical ``Jersey Girl,'' which Miramax recently moved from a scheduled fall release to sometime next spring.

``Jersey Girl'' might just buck history in that it's the second movie Affleck and Lopez made together, and it's rumored to be better than ``Gigli.'' (Admittedly, not a tall order.) Syndicated advice columnist Carolyn Hax sees that possibility as a good thing, especially for married couples that might be watching.

``People say, 'Why wouldn't marital doldrums show up on screen?' '' Hax says. ``I guess it's logical. But that's kind of sad, too. I'm not sure I believe in marital doldrums. I believe in marital comfort and people who are comfortable together can have great chemistry. Maybe we just need to find a Hollywood couple who's comfortable together.''

Reel couples through the years

KATHARINE HEPBURN and SPENCER TRACY

Where they met: On the set of the George Stevens gem ``Woman of the Year'' (1942).

Collaborative high point: ``Adam's Rib'' (1949) is the sharpest of their romantic comedies, cementing their respective personas pretty much for the duration of their careers.

Collaborative low point: Yes, ``Guess Who's Coming to Dinner'' won a truckload of awards, including an Oscar for Hepburn, but it hasn't aged well. They're fine, but the movie is drab, stilted and maudlin, an unfitting final chapter in a partnership that spanned eight films over a quarter century.

HUMPHREY BOGART and LAUREN BACALL

Where they met: On the set of the Howard Hawks classic ``To Have and Have Not'' (1944) with Bacall uttering the great come-on line: ``You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and ... blow.''

Collaborative high point: Hawks' ``The Big Sleep'' (1946) remains the greatest private-eye film ever made.

Collaborative low point: Bogie and Bacall never embarrassed themselves. ``Dead Reckoning'' (1947), ``Dark Passage'' (1947) and ``Key Largo'' (1948) are rather conventional when compared to ``The Big Sleep,'' but then what movie isn't?

ELIZABETH TAYLOR and RICHARD BURTON

Where they met: On the set of the disastrous historical (hysterical?) epic ``Cleopatra'' (1963).

Collaborative high point: ``Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' (1967) was the Holy Grail for Liz and Dick obsessives, a melodramatic shocker (at least for the time) that knowingly played off the couple's tabloid infamies.

Collaborative low point: We could go with howlers like ``The Sandpiper'' (1965), ``Doctor Faustus'' (1967) or ``Hammersmith Is Out''(1972), but Tennessee Williams' ``Boom'' (1968) has the best kitsch value, if only for Liz's series of outrageous headwear.

TOM CRUISE and NICOLE KIDMAN

Where they met: On the set of the Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer auto-racing melodrama ``Days of Thunder'' (1990).

Collaborative high point: Stanley Kubrick's ``Eyes Wide Shut'' (1999), though Tom and Nicole weren't exactly believable as a married couple, were they?

Collaborative low point: In ``Far and Away'' (1992), Cruise and Kidman went to Ireland and tried to make like John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara in ``The Quiet Man.'' It was a load of blarney.

CAPTION(S):

10 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) Hollywood chemistry test

How Jen and Ben measure up to other screen couples

(2) The attention over Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck's real-life engagement has added a twist to ``Gigli,'' opening Friday, which the stars filmed before they began dating.

(3) Tracy and Hepburn met while filming the romantic comedy ``Woman of the Year.'' The rest is history.

(4) Bacall and Bogie, pictured in ``Key Largo,'' were the exception among Hollywood couples: They generated heat on screen.

(5) Dick and Liz kept appearing in films and plays together as if to convince the world that their relationship was solid.

(6) The tepid chemistry in ``Eyes Wide Shut'' led some to wonder if Tom and Nicole were bound for Splitsville.

(7 -- 8) Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe, above, had a fling during the filming of ``Proof of Life,'' but audiences found their passion DOA; Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, right, also failed to set off sparks when the theater lights dimmed.

(9) Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward have enjoyed one of show biz's most enduring marriages, but their movies, including ``A New Kind of Love,'' don't reval any secrets.

(10) The love scene between Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger in ``The Getaway'' never really got anywhere-perplexing many viewers, including Brad Pitt.

Box:

Reel couples through the years (see text)