It Ends With Us?
More like… it’s just starting between them.
As you may have already read about, Blake Lively accused Justin Baldoni last month of sexual harassment on the set of their recent hit movie; claiming her co-star created a hostile work environment on the film’s set and later took part in a smear campaign against his colleague.
And now Baldoni has fired back.
Attorneys for the the 40-year old filed a $400 million lawsuit in the Southern District of New York on January 16 on behalf of Baldoni, producer Jamey Heath, publicist Jennifer Abel and crisis publicist Melissa Nathan.
Baldoni is taking legal action on allegations of civil extortion… defamation… false light invasion of privacy… breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing… intentional interference with contractual relations… intentional interference with prospective economic advantage… and negligent interference with prospective economic advantage.
The actor also directed It Ends With Us.
He says in these documents that Lively was “determined to make Baldoni the real-life villain of her story,” and “falsified stories” of his sexual harassment, noting that the Gossip Girl alum’s damaged reputation following the release of this movie was “of her own making,” and NOT a smear campaign, as her lawsuit states.
Baldoni cites “disastrous misjudgments” made by Lively, who served as a producer on the film and who reportedly determined the flick’s final cut.
“Lively, working with her husband, her publicist, and Jones, among others, set out on a campaign to tar and feather Plaintiffs in the press,” reads the lawsuit.
“They conspired and worked in concert with the New York Times to put out a blockbuster news report as devastating as it was false.”
Lively, of course, is married to Ryan Reynolds.
The lawsuit even documents a meeting at Lively and Reynolds’ New York City apartment awhile back during which Taylor Swift popped in to applaud a re-write made by Lively on a scene in the movie.
Baldoni’s filing further claims that Lively “set out to destroy Plaintiffs’ livelihoods and businesses if they did not bend to her incessant demands, and when they refused to give way, she did exactly that, accusing them of foul and reprehensible sexual misconduct.”
Elsewhere in the lawsuit, Baldoni alleges that Lively “had a reputation of being difficult to work with,” and “almost immediately” began “inserting herself into the production process in intrusive ways well beyond the scope of her contractual entitlements.”
This included examples of Lively’s control over her character’s wardrobe and rewriting scripts.
Baldoni’s lawyer previously denied the claims made against his client.
These claims include how Baldoni caused “severe emotional distress” to Lively as a result of his behavior on set… which included “showing nude videos or images of women to Blake,” along with discussion of Baldoni’s past “pornography addiction” or “sexual conquests.”
In a new statement, the aforementioned attorney says:
“This lawsuit is a legal action based on an overwhelming amount of untampered evidence detailing Blake Lively and her team’s duplicitous attempt to destroy Justin Baldoni, his team and their respective companies by disseminating grossly edited, unsubstantiated, new and doctored information to the media.
“It is clear based on our own all out willingness to provide all complete text messages, emails, video footage and other documentary evidence that was shared between the parties in real time, that this is a battle she will not win and will certainly regret.
“Blake Lively was either severely misled by her team or intentionally and knowingly misrepresented the truth.”
This latest message concludes:
Let’s not forget, 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.
We know the truth, and now the public does too.
Justin and his team have nothing to hide, documents do not lie.”
