It’s the battle of the bonitas.
Rosie Perez and Jennifer Lopez have some serious bad blood — and don’t expect either to turn the other chica with the publication of Perez’s new memoir, “Handbook for an Unpredictable Life” (Crown), out Feb. 25.
The two Puerto Rican actresses met in New York in 1991 at an open casting call for the sketch-comedy show “In Living Color,” where Perez, now 49, was a choreographer.
Brooklynite Perez immediately noticed Bronx-born Jenny from the Block’s best asset, recalling her as a beautiful girl with a “big ass.”
But show host and creator Keenan Ivory Wayans wasn’t as taken by J.Lo, calling her “chubby and corny,” and refusing to hire her.
Perez became the big-bootied newcomer’s booster, eventually swaying Wayans — but only if J.Lo cut her hair and dropped 20 pounds.
J.Lo’s inner diva quickly emerged. “All of the girls were coming into my office complaining how she was manipulating wardrobe, makeup, and me, all to her advantage,” Perez writes.
Lopez, now 44, shrugged it off, saying the other girls were just “jealous.”
But Lopez dropped her “sweet-girl act” and “went off” on Perez like “some ghetto biatch, screaming and pounding her chest!” writes Perez.
“You pick on me, me and only me, every f–king day! Every f–king day! I work my ass off, deliver and you keep pushing me aside, treating me like sh-t! I know I’m good! I’m better than any of these girls, and you know it,” Lopez roared.
J.Lo left the show after two seasons but didn’t drop her beef — Perez says she made “disparaging comments” about her after hitting it big in Hollywood.
“I was blindsided,” writes Perez. “I’d thought we were cool. I called her up. She wouldn’t pick up. Frustrated, I left her an irate message on her answering machine. Instead of calling me back and hashing it out like friends do, she went on a major talk show and reiterated my lashing,” Perez writes.
Months later, the two bumped into each other at a club.
“Jennifer came over to me, smiling, saying hello as if nothing had happened. I should’ve let it go, played it off, too. Instead, I killed her with my biting tongue,” Perez writes without elaborating.
The two have apparently sparred over the film rights to the story of Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina on the Supreme Court, according to the National Enquirer.
“We ladies of color all know how hard it is for us in the entertainment business,” Perez laments in the book.
“This kind of sh-t hurts us all and those that follow in our footsteps.”