Justin Baldoni sues Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds and others in new lawsuit
Justin Baldoni has filed a new civil lawsuit against Blake Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds, the couple's publicist Leslie Sloane and Sloane's public relations company Vision PR for, among other things, extortion and defamation.
Baldoni, who directed and starred in the film "It Ends With Us" with Lively, is accusing Lively of having "robbed" Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios LLC of control of the film, as well as destroying Baldoni's "personal and professional reputations and livelihood."
The suit lists Baldoni, Wayfarer, Baldoni's publicist Jennifer Abel; Melissa Nathan, a crisis PR specialist hired by Wayfarer Studios; and Jamey Heath, Baldoni's friend, podcast co-host, and Wayfarer CEO, as plaintiffs. They are currently seeking $400 million in damages.
"Lively stole Wayfarer’s movie, hijacked Wayfarer’s premiere, destroyed Plaintiffs’ personal and professional reputations and livelihood, and aimed to drive Plaintiffs out of business entirely," the suit reads.
The suit claims Lively pushed a "false and damaging narrative" against Baldoni that was "rife with lies and doctored 'evidence'" in accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of "It Ends with Us."
Lively first raised allegations of sexual harassment against Baldoni and accused him and his publicity team of trying to destroy her reputation in a complaint she filed in December with the California Civil Rights Department, which included numerous text messages and communications she claimed were part of a campaign to attack her public image. The New York Times was the first to report Lively's legal complaint.
Lively then formally filed a lawsuit in New York against Baldoni and other defendants again, alleging sexual harassment.
Bryan Freedman, the attorney for Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios, denied all allegations.
Baldoni's suit accuses Sloane of having gone "so far as to propagate malicious stories portraying Baldoni as a sexual predator" and Reynolds of using the term to describe Baldoni in a call with Baldoni's agent. The suit claims Reynolds told Baldoni's rep to "drop" him as a client.
Baldoni also accused Reynolds of launching into an "aggressive tirade, berating Baldoni in what Baldoni later described as a 'traumatic' encounter" at the couple's home during the film's production.
The suit claims Baldoni and the other plaintiffs were "the targets of a calculated and vitriolic smear campaign" lodged by the defendants and that Lively, leveraging her and her husband's star power, took control of the film -- including Lively having her own cut of it.
Baldoni's attorney, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement, "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," Freedman continued.
Freedman ended his statement by saying, "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 responded to the lawsuit in a statement on Thursday and called it "another chapter in the abuser playbook."
"This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim," the statement said. "This is what experts call DARVO. Deny. Attack. Reverse Victim Offender."
It continued, "Wayfarer has opted to use the resources of its billionaire co-founder to issue media statements, launch meritless lawsuits, and threaten litigation to overwhelm the public’s ability to understand that what they are doing is retaliation against sexual harassment allegations. They are trying to shift the narrative to Ms. Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr. Baldoni."
"The evidence will show that the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer," it added. "The evidence will also show that Sony asked Ms. Lively to oversee Sony’s cut of the film, which they then selected for distribution and was a resounding success."
"Their response to sexual harassment allegations: she wanted it, it’s her fault. Their justification for why this happened to her: look what she was wearing. In short, while the victim focuses on the abuse, the abuser focuses on the victim," the statement said.
Lively's legal team ended the statement by saying, "The strategy of attacking the woman is desperate, it does not refute the evidence in Ms. Lively’s complaint, and it will fail.”
Baldoni's latest action in his legal battle against Lively comes after he had filed a lawsuit against The New York Times on Dec. 31 for libel and false light invasion of privacy, after it published the story "We Can Bury Anyone" on Dec. 22, which included reporting on Lively's complaint. That same day, Lively formally filed her lawsuit in New York against Baldoni and other defendants.
Baldoni was reportedly dropped from his talent agency after the story was published.
In his complaint against The New York Times, Baldoni accused the newspaper of relying on "cherry-picked" and altered communications, with details "stripped of necessary context and deliberately spliced" to "mislead."
In a statement to ABC News, The New York Times denied Baldoni's accusations and said their original story was "meticulously and responsibly reported," and that their report was "based on a review of thousands of pages of original documents, including the text messages and emails that we quote accurately and at length in the article."
Lively's attorney issued a statement amid the ongoing feud.
"Ms. Lively's federal litigation before the Southern District of New York involves serious claims of sexual harassment and retaliation, backed by concrete facts. This is not a 'feud' arising from 'creative differences' or a 'he said/she said' situation. As alleged in Ms. Lively's complaint, and as we will prove in litigation, Wayfarer and its associates engaged in unlawful, retaliatory astroturfing against Ms. Lively for simply trying to protect herself and others on a film set," the statement read in part.
In recent days, both Baldoni and Lively's attorney have issued statements on the ongoing legal feud.
Both Baldoni and Lively are seeking a jury trial.
