This whole It Ends With Us feud just got turned on its head again!
Late on New Year’s Eve, in what will surely go down as the last bombshell celebrity news item of 2024, Justin Baldoni filed a massive $250 million libel lawsuit against The New York Times. Why? He says Blake Lively lied about him — and the Times helped! He and his fellow plaintiffs argues the paper, which did the initial full reporting on Blake’s legal filing accusing him of sexual harassment, took the Gossip Girl star’s word on everything, even when they knew — or easily could have found — the truth.
Probably the biggest point of Blake’s legal filing was the accusation of sexual harassment. She painted a portrait of a real pig — a director who used his position of power to speak to women in inappropriate ways and cross crucial boundaries.
One aspect was in their love scenes. Blake and Justin played two of the film’s romantic leads, and that required some steamy scenes. Always awkward between a director and his actress, we imagine… But Blake said it was worse than that…
In her complaint, Blake says even before shooting, she objected to extra sex scenes Justin “wanted to add that she considered gratuitous.” She says in response to her input, Justin’s Wayfarer Studios “agreed to provide a full-time intimacy coordinator.” That makes it sound like she had to fight for an intimacy coordinator, the hot new Hollywood position that makes sure all actors in a sex scene are comfortable with everything they’re doing, that everything is communicated well beforehand.
The problem? Justin claims Blake never once met with the intimacy coordinator! In his lawsuit, the filmmaker fires back:
“Also misleading, the Article draws on Lively’s assertion that Baldoni ‘improvised unwanted kissing and discussed his sex life[.]’ However, both the Times and Lively intentionally exclude that Lively refused to meet with the intimacy coordinator to plan out the Film’s sex scenes. Baldoni, in turn, was forced to meet with the intimacy coordinator alone and relay any suggestions to Lively separately.”
Whoa, WHAT?! That defeats the whole point of the intimacy coordinator! It’s great for the director to talk through ideas with them, but they’re supposed to make sure everything gets communicated clearly to all parties! Justin is saying he had to then bring those ideas to Blake, opening him up to these accusations later! The suit states:
“Notwithstanding Baldoni’s reluctance, he and Lively would later sketch out the scenes together, absent the intimacy coordinator. As part of those creative discussions, Baldoni and Lively sought to personalize and develop their characters and, in doing so, engaged in conversation about their individual experiences. The Times, taking Lively’s CRD Complaint as true, characterizes this discussion as an inappropriate attempt by Baldoni to talk about his sex life–it was not. More still, Baldoni consistently acted at the direction of the intimacy coordinator. These baseless accusations do not constitute sexual harassment.”
Blake’s legal filing did accuse Justin of talking about his sex life with her, something which would be considered highly inappropriate in almost all circumstances. One of the 30 demands she included in the suit was:
3. No more discussions to Blake Lively and/or her employees about personal experiences with sex, including as it relates to spouses or others.
But he says his discussions of sex were completely a result of trying to relay ideas from the intimacy coordinator — since Blake refused to attend those meetings!
He says Blake’s list of demands to Wayfarer implied malfeasance on his part, but many of those demands were already being met!
“For example, Lively demanded that an intimacy coordinator be present at all times when Lively was on set. In fact, an intimacy coordinator had already been engaged during the first half of production, so Wayfarer took no issue with this request.”
We know Lizzy Talbot and Chelsea Cary were the intimacy coordinators they hired — two women. And Blake KNEW that! Justin provided proof in the suit by way of screen grab of his texts with Blake about it. He wrote:
“Just hired intimacy coordinator who I LOVE. Will set you up to meet/FT [FaceTime] with her next week for intro.”
Blake pushed off meeting her in advance right then — but did agree to meet on set:
“I feel good. I can meet her when we start 🙂 thank you though!”
And another receipt? He had to text one of the film’s producers to tell her about Blake not wanting to meet with the intimacy coordinator yet:
But it turns out once they did start, per Justin, she still “refused to meet” with them!
“Contrary to Lively’s assertion, it was she who refused to meet with the intimacy coordinator to plan out scenes, putting Baldoni in the awkward position of meeting with the intimacy coordinator alone and later relaying sex scene suggestions to Lively in the intimacy coordinator’s absence—not only defeating the purpose but resulting in accusations by the Times that, before shooting began, Baldoni wanted to add sex scenes that Lively considered gratuitous; in fact, these scenes were proposed by the intimacy coordinator. This is well-documented in hand-written notes Baldoni took during meetings with the intimacy coordinator… Baldoni’s dated, hand-written notes from his meetings with the intimacy coordinator, which again, Lively declined attending, were read to Lively at her penthouse, where she insisted she and Baldoni meet to write sex scenes together.
Not only that, he says she was the first to speak about her personal sexual preferences in response to a note from the intimacy coordinator:
“In response to a proposal from the intimacy coordinator that ‘Ryle’ not orgasm after he satisfied ‘Lily,’ Lively remarked: ‘I’d be mortified if that happened to me’, to which Baldoni, following Lively’s lead in what seemed like an attempt to connect and develop their characters, remarked that ‘those have been some of the most beautiful moments with [my wife] and I’.”
Is that really what she was talking about when mentioning him talking about his sex life with her?? If so, would you agree with him when he says she “distorts” the conversation in her legal filing??
It sounds like having an intimacy coordinator present could have helped preclude any misunderstandings about such conversations. So if he’s right, and she did refuse to meet with one, was that leaving both of them vulnerable to misunderstandings?
Not only that, if what he claims is true, did Blake also mischaracterize her interaction with the intimacy coordinators to the press? She told Digital Spy around the time of the film’s release in August:
“You coordinate stunts, you coordinate dancing. It is choreography. So to be able to say ‘This is what happens here, here and here’ in a stunt, and ‘This is what happens here, here and here’ in a dance, but ‘Now you guys just go put your bodies together and your mouths and whatever, and action and cut,’ that’s ridiculous. I think that being choreographed is critical for everyone’s safety.”
Huh. She doesn’t mention refusing to actually meet with these women.
Damn, this is a really big discrepancy! What do YOU think, Perezcious readers? Where would the truth lie here??
[Image via Sony/YouTube.]
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