All Of Justin Baldoni’s Allegations Against Blake Lively Explained—As He Releases ‘It Ends With Us’ Outtakes – Forbes
“It Ends With Us” director and star Justin Baldoni has filed a $400 million countersuit against co-star Blake Lively, claiming the actress “hijacked” the film he was directing, falsely claimed sexual harassment to bury negative sentiments against her and launched her own “calculated and vitriolic smear campaign” to destroy his career, after she alleged he sexually harassed her on set and helped engineer an online campaign to damage her reputation.Justin Baldoni at the Annual Voices of Solidarity Awards on Dec. 9, 2024.Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios, publicist Jennifer Abel, crisis management expert Melissa Nathan and other plaintiffs filed a lawsuit on Thursday in New York Federal Court against Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds, her publicist Leslie Sloane and Sloane’s firm Vision PR.The complaint filed Thursday counters many of the claims made by Lively last month in her own lawsuit against Baldoni, and also alleges she knowingly invented false sexual harassment claims meant to destroy Baldoni’s reputation and bury the negative press attention she received surrounding the film’s release.The suit claims that Lively, who was publicly blasted for her “tone-deaf” promotion of a film centered around domestic violence, “could not tolerate her publicly tainted image for even a moment” and decided to use Baldoni as a “scapegoat” by accusing him of harassment and creating a hostile work environment.His latest lawsuit repeats many of the claims made in a Dec. 31 action against The New York Times, in which Baldoni claimed he was steamrolled on set by Lively’s constant attempts to change things about the film, was “aggressively berated” by Lively’s husband Reynolds over a misunderstanding about fat shaming and said that Lively persistently tried to overstep Baldoni in the editing process.It also repeats claims that Lively refused to promote the film with Baldoni, had him removed from all promotional materials and posters, attempted to have him banned from the film’s premiere under threat of a boycott and ultimately permitted him attend “under humiliating conditions” (he has said he was relegated to the basement of the event and was “barred from the exclusive afterparty”).Much of Baldoni’s allegations run in opposition to Lively’s claims (which are fully explored in this story).Get Forbes Breaking News Text Alerts: We’re launching text message alerts so you’ll always know the biggest stories shaping the day’s headlines. Text “Alerts” to (201) 335-0739 or sign up here.“Ms. Lively and her team attempted to bulldoze reputations and livelihoods for heinously selfish reasons through their own dangerous manipulation of the media before even taking any actual legal action,” Baldoni’s attorney, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement. “We know the truth, and now the public does too. Justin and his team have nothing to hide, documents do not lie.”Lively’s legal team in a statement called Baldoni’s lawsuit “another chapter in the abuser playbook.” They push back on Baldoni’s claims that Lively tried to seize creative control and alienated him from the cast, and promise evidence will show Sony asked Lively to oversee a separate cut of the film and that “the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer.” “The strategy of attacking the woman is desperate, it does not refute the evidence in Ms. Lively’s complaint, and it will fail,” her attorneys said. In an earlier statement, Lively’s lawyers said Baldoni is utilizing “a classic tactic to distract from allegations of this type of misconduct” by blaming the victim, suggesting Lively brought the misconduct on herself and suggesting the offender is actually the victim.A text message included in Baldoni’s lawsuit shows an alleged exchange with Lively in which she compares herself to the character Khaleesi from “Game of Thrones,” and calls Reynolds and superstar friend Taylor Swift her “dragons.” The lawsuit says Lively made changes to certain scenes in the script Baldoni was pressured to accept after being “summoned” to a meeting with Reynolds and Swift, who he called “two of of the most influential and wealthy celebrities in the world, who were not afraid to make things very difficult for him.” In the meeting, the pair praised Lively’s version of the script changes, Baldoni says. The text exchange included in the suit slows Baldoni telling Lively he liked her rewrites, and “would have felt that way without Ryan and Taylor.” Lively responded and said they are her “most trusted partners and the people I go to first with anything creative I touch,” later describing them as her “dragons” and saying, “we all benefit from those gorgeous monsters of mine. 😄 You will too, I can promise you.” In a red carpet interview a year later, Lively told an interviewer her husband, Reynolds, had actually written the new scene.In his lawsuit against the pair, Baldoni claims Reynolds and Lively pressured the talent agency they shared, WME, to drop him as a client. The Jan. 16 complaint says Reynolds approached a talent executive, called Baldoni a ‘sexual predator’ and demanded they cut ties. The agency has since refuted the claim the couple was involved in its decision to separate from the actor.Freedman told Megyn Kelly that Lively hadn’t read the book the film was based on, and said she “didn’t understand” some of the content of the movie, leading to confusion on set. Baldoni repeated the claims in his lawsuit against her, and said her “wrongheaded creative decisions reflected her fundamental lack of understanding of the book the film was based on.” A text message included in the filing between Baldoni and producer Jamey Heath said she had her “reasons” for not wanting to read the source material, but that it led to tone-deaf incidents like the naming of a drink at the afterparty “Ryle You Wait” after the character who committed domestic violence in the film. Lively has not specifically responded to claims she didn’t read “It Ends With Us.”Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni on the set of “It Ends with Us” on Jan. 12, 2024.Lively made her initial claims against Baldoni in a Dec. 20 complaint with the California Civil Rights Department and repeated many of the same allegations in a Dec. 31 lawsuit in New York federal court against Baldoni, his publicist, Wayfarer Studios and other defendants for “retaliating against her for reporting sexual harassment and workplace safety concerns.” Much of Lively’s lawsuit hinges on bombshell text messages largely sent between Baldoni, his publicist Jennifer Abel and crisis management expert Melissa Nathan that appear to show him encouraging his P.R. team to spread damaging narratives about Lively, flagging social media posts for them to use and showing concern the negative press could be traced back to him and his team. In his lawsuit against the Times, however, Baldoni presents other private communications in which he seems to tell Nathan and Abel he is “more worried about” the perception that they are “planting … stories which is not true obviously” and “How can we say somehow that we are not doing any of this — it looks like we are trying to take her down.” Other messages show Nathan reassuring Baldoni that the negative media about Lively around the release of “It Ends With Us” was inevitable, and that the press and fans had enough ammunition to criticize her without his team’s help. The lawsuit against the Times calls the attacks on Lively “self-induced backlash” and says her claims of a smear campaign are a response to her embarrassment and “a dubious attempt to resuscitate her public image.” Lively also claims in her lawsuit that she was subject to sexual harassment, specifically saying Baldoni would enter her trailer without consent while she was undressed and sometimes breastfeeding her newborn baby. The Baldoni lawsuit includes text messages meant to counter Lively’s version of events, including one from the actress in which she invites him to work on a scene, saying, “I’m just pumping in my trailer if you wanna work on our lines.”Lawyers for Justin Baldoni on Jan. 21 released 10 minutes worth of footage from the set of “It Ends With Us” in an effort to refute a claim of Lively’s that he acted inappropriately while shooting a slow dancing scene for the film. In her lawsuit against him, Lively claimed Baldoni “leaned forward and slowly dragged his lips from her ear and down her neck as he said, ‘it smells so good.’” The footage shows a similar interaction, where Baldoni is seen nuzzling Lively’s neck, and she says, “I’m probably getting spray-tan on you,” to which he responds, “It smells good.” In another scene, Baldoni leans in to kiss Lively and she pulls back, saying “I think we should be talking. I think it’s more romantic if we’re like dancing and talking.” The video includes all the takes of the scene, his team said, and shows both actors clearly behaved “well within the scope of the scene and with mutual respect and professionalism.” Lively’s team, however, said the footage shows that she’s clearly uncomfortable and that “any woman who has been inappropriately touched in the workplace” would recognize that.Baldoni filed an 87-page lawsuit on Dec. 31 against the Times, accusing the newspaper of libel after it published an explosive story into Lively’s claims of harassment. The piece, titled “‘We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine” detailed what Lively alleges was a calculated attempt by Baldoni and PR representatives he hired to smear her name as retaliation for speaking out against harassment allegations during the production of “It Ends With Us” (Lively was not named as a party in the lawsuit). Baldoni sued the newspaper for libel and false light invasion of privacy, and in his later lawsuit against Lively accused her of working “for months” with the Times to prepare the narrative reported in the story. He also accused her of using her follow-up lawsuit against Baldoni to “shield her behind-the-scenes conspiracy” with the paper. The Times has defended its article as “meticulously and responsibly reported,” and said the Times shared its reporting with Baldoni, Wayfarer and other defendants, who “chose not to have any conversations with The Times or address any of the specific text messages or documents.” The paper said it plans to “vigorously defend against the lawsuit.” In a statement addressing Baldoni’s suit against Lively, which also makes allegations against the Times, the paper said the claims are “meritless and recycled from the equally baseless claims in the suit that was filed against The Times in California.”Baldoni’s lawsuit accuses the Times of misunderstanding the intent of the upside-down smile emoji, which they say is meant to convey irony or sarcasm. The Times cited a text message in which Abel praises Nathan for influencing an anti-Lively news article in its report, writing, “You really outdid yourself with this piece”—but omitting the emoji that followed—“🙃.” Nathan responded with “That’s why you hired me right? I’m the best.” Baldoni’s lawsuit argues the use of the emoji makes it clear Abel was joking—and Nathan didn’t have anything to do with the story.He says yes. The lawsuit against The New York Times accuses the paper of ignoring that Leslie Sloane, Lively’s publicist, planted her own negative stories about Baldoni, including that he “was a sexual predator.” The lawsuit accuses Sloane of feeding false stories to the Daily Mail and the New York Post, including one article alleging there were multiple HR complaints against Baldoni made during production. In a statement to Deadline, Sloane said claims she was the origin of stories about HR complaints on set are “false.”Lively claimed in her lawsuit that Baldoni repeatedly objectified her on set, including by “finding back channel ways of criticizing her body and weight.” The example she cited was one in which Baldoni “secretly called her fitness trainer, without her knowledge or permission, and implied that he wanted her to lose weight in two weeks,” the lawsuit claims. It went on: “Mr. Baldoni told the trainer that he had asked because he was concerned about having to pick Ms. Lively up in a scene for the movie, but there was no such scene.” In his own lawsuit, Baldoni said he did ask the trainer about Lively’s weight but only to “ensure he could safely perform the lift without injury,” citing bulging discs in his back. Baldoni’s lawsuit claims Lively later “refused to perform the lift scene, even though it had already been rehearsed with a stunt double.”In his lawsuit, Baldoni also claimed that he was the target of an “inappropriate and humiliating berating” from Reynolds in front of other celebrity friends during production. Baldoni said that at a meeting before filming resumed after Hollywood strikes, Reynolds “launched into a tirade” at him over a list of grievances he and Lively had compiled in what Baldoni described as a “traumatic encounter.” He said he had “never been spoken to like that in his life” and that a representative for Sony later expressed regret for not stepping in. Baldoni said Reynolds called for him to apologize for fat shaming his wife, among other demands. Reynolds hasn’t publicly commented on Baldoni’s allegations.Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds attend the “It Ends With Us” New York Premiere at AMC Lincoln Square … [+] Theater on Aug. 6, 2024.While promoting the film, Baldoni said Lively was “involved in every aspect of the film” and called her a “powerhouse of a creative and a wonderful collaborator.” In his New York Times lawsuit, however, he says both Lively and her husband overstepped in their attempts to control the film and that he wasn’t respected as the movie’s director. He cited an interview Lively gave during the movie’s press tour in which she says her husband wrote one of the film’s iconic scenes, and said the interview was the first time he learned Reynolds “made unauthorized changes to the script in secret.” The lawsuit says Lively interfered with his authority in the editing process and despite Baldoni “incorporating seven pages of her notes” into his edit, she allegedly created her own cut of the film and threatened not to promote the film if her version wasn’t seriously considered for release. The studio ultimately agreed to “audience test” both versions of the film under the condition that Lively would support whichever performed better, the lawsuit says, but “despite Baldoni’s cut scoring significantly higher with audiences… Lively reneged on her promise” and the studio “once again conceded.”In his lawsuit against The New York Times, Baldoni said Lively tried to keep him from the film’s premiere and that he was ultimately allowed to to attend “under humiliating conditions.” The complaint said Baldoni was “barred from the exclusive afterparty,” and more details were revealed in his attorney’s interview with Kelly. The clip, posted to YouTube, included a newly released voice note from Baldoni explaining that he was “sent to the basement” of the film’s premiere for over an hour with his friends and family for over an hour after walking the red carpet. In the clip, Baldoni said he was exiled from the event because an unnamed woman “didn’t want me anywhere near her or the rest of the cast.” Kelly didn’t say how she obtained the voice memo.Baldoni’s attorney continued to defend him against Lively’s allegations, specifically fighting back against claims she was sexually harassed and shown pornography on the set of the film. He said that if Lively was sexually harassed, “she wouldn’t have returned to the film,” and said the pornography she said she was shown was actually a video of a home birth brought up while preparing for a birth scene in “It Ends With Us.” Freedman pushed back against claims Baldoni hired Nathan to smear Lively, instead alleging she was hired to fight back against negative stories about Baldoni placed by Sloane. The attorney also commented on speculation that a character in Reynolds’ most recent Marvel film, “Deadpool & Wolverine,” was given lines written to mock Baldoni. He vowed to release “every single text message, every single document, everything on a website” and let the public decide “whether or not there was sexual harassment.”Rumors of a rift developing between Lively and Baldoni started to emerge ahead of the film’s premiere and were fueled by the press tour, during which the pair made no joint appearances (an odd arrangement for a film’s star and its director and co-star). Lively appeared to avoid mention of Baldoni in interviews, though he repeatedly praised her work on the film, and the two were never photographed together during promotion. Lively, Reynolds, several cast members and Hoover also all unfollowed Baldoni on Instagram around the time of the movie’s release. As rumors of a feud grew, Baldoni hired Melissa Nathan, a crisis PR manager who had represented Johnny Depp in his defamation case against ex-wife Amber Heard. At the same time, several unflattering narratives about Lively started to spread on social media. Lively was the subject of intense criticism online targeting how she promoted the film as fans slammed her for upbeat tone on the press tour and said she was attempting to promote the movie as a lighthearted love story, cheapening its serious take on domestic abuse. Lively appeared to respond to the criticism on her Instagram story on Aug. 13, when she shared several posts talking about how the film gets “a message so important out there to the masses” and shared statistics on domestic violence. Lively was also criticized for seeming to promote her newly launched hair-care line, and a resurfaced video clip of a 2016 interaction with an interviewer also drew fresh critique. Lively claimed in her civil rights complaint that the negative narratives were part of the calculated campaign orchestrated by Baldoni. She repeated the claim in the lawsuit against Baldoni, his publicist, Wayfarer Studios and other defendants.One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. 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