Blake Lively’s Bombshell Case Against Justin Baldoni: Inside the ‘Stressful’ Ordeal (Exclusive)

• PEOPLE's new cover story goes behind the scenes of the burgeoning legal battle between It Ends With Us costars Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni

• Hollywood power players respond after Lively accuses Baldoni of sexual harassment on the set of the movie and retaliating against her for speaking up — allegations he denies

• Insiders share what's next as the entertainment industry endures another scandal
  

As Blake Lively and the cast of It Ends With Us began promoting the film last summer, it didn’t take long for fans to notice something seemed amiss.

Lively, costars Jenny Slate and Brandon Sklenar as well as author Colleen Hoover — whose 2016 novel about domestic violence was adapted into the film — did not follow the movie’s director and star Justin Baldoni on Instagram.

Baldoni was absent from group appearances, including a screening at the Book Bonanza festival in Grapevine, Texas, in June. And at the Aug. 6 New York City premiere, the Jane the Virgin alum didn’t take any photos with the main cast — though the others smiled and posed together.

As TikTokers and Instagram commenters buzzed about a rift between Lively and Baldoni, a set source hinted to PEOPLE at the time the truth would emerge: “There is much more to the story.”

That saga is now coming to light. In a bombshell complaint filed with the California Civil Rights Department on Dec. 20, lawyers for Lively, 37, claimed Baldoni, 40, whose production company, Wayfarer Studios, developed the hit film, sexually harassed the actress and then retaliated against her with a smear campaign after she spoke up.

The filing — a prerequisite before bringing a workplace harassment lawsuit in the state of California — sets the stage for what has the potential to be an ugly legal battle and shines a light on allegations of ongoing sexism in Hollywood years after the #MeToo movement.

Related: Blake Lively’s A Simple Favor 2 Costar Michele Morrone Says He ‘Felt Her Pain’ Over Justin Baldoni's Alleged Behavior

“I hope that my legal action helps pull back the curtain on these sinister retaliatory tactics to harm people who speak up about misconduct and helps protect others who may be targeted,” Lively said in a statement to The New York Times.

Baldoni’s lawyer Bryan Freedman called the allegations “false, outrageous and intentionally salacious with an intent to publicly hurt” in a Dec. 21 statement.

But the fallout has already begun. Baldoni was dropped by his agency, WME (which also reps Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds), the day the news of Lively’s complaint broke. Two days later, journalist Liz Plank, the cohost of Baldoni’s The Man Enough Podcast, announced she had quit the show.

Sony, which distributed It Ends With Us, the actors union SAG-AFTRA and celebrities including some of Lively’s It Ends With Us costars have spoken out to support Lively.

“What has been revealed about the attack on Blake is terribly dark, disturbing, and wholly threatening,” Slate said in a statement. “I commend my friend, I admire her bravery, and I stand by her side.”

Related: Justin Baldoni Spends Time with Wife in First Sighting Since Blake Lively's Sexual Harassment Allegations

Among Lively’s many allegations: Baldoni — a married father of two who has positioned himself as an ally to women and domestic abuse survivors in numerous interviews — walked into her makeup trailer uninvited while she was breast-feeding; talked about a previous pornography addiction; alluded to past non-consensual sexual encounters and asked Lively to divulge details of her own “intimate life.”

She claims he “suddenly” pressured her to “simulate full nudity” in a birth scene, “bit and sucked on” her lower lip in a scene in which he “improvised numerous kisses;” and “routinely degraded Ms. Lively by finding back channel ways of criticizing her body and weight,” including one instance when he allegedly cried to Lively in her trailer “claiming social media commentators were saying that Ms. Lively looked old and unattractive based on paparazzi photos from the set.”

In the 80-page document, Lively’s lawyers claim production on the film was nearly derailed due to Baldoni’s behavior, which created a “hostile work environment” for the star and others, including another unnamed actress he allegedly harassed.

The film got back on track, they allege, after a Jan. 4, 2024  “all-hands” meeting between Baldoni, Wayfarer CEO Jamey Heath (who is also accused of sexual harassment in the complaint), other film execs, Lively and Reynolds (whom the actress brought as her representative), where they hashed out a plan to improve working conditions on the set.

Some of the key points Baldoni agreed to, according to the filing: an intimacy coordinator on set when Lively was present, no improvised kissing, no more talk of his own sex life or genitalia, and no more discussion of Lively’s deceased father, Ernie, with whom Baldoni had allegedly claimed he had communicated from beyond the grave.

But that meeting, lawyers for Lively assert, was not the end of the problem, just the start of another. After filming wrapped and the movie’s Aug. 9 release grew closer,

Lively’s legal team contends Baldoni and his publicist Jennifer Abel worked with crisis PR guru Melissa Nathan (who worked for Johnny Depp during his defamation trial against ex-wife Amber Heard), billionaire Wayfarer co-founder Steve Sarowitz and an independent contractor in Texas, Jed Wallace, to smear Lively’s reputation.

“[They] embarked on a sophisticated press and digital plan in retaliation for Ms. Lively exercising her legally-protected right to speak up about their misconduct on the set, with the additional objective of intimidating her and anyone else from revealing in public what actually occurred,” according to the complaint.

Related: All of the Stars Who Have Publicly Supported Blake Lively Amid Her Sexual Harassment Complaint Against It Ends with Us Costar Justin Baldoni

Lively’s lawyers filed exhibits featuring text messages and emails, which were obtained through a subpoena, showing communication between the parties discussing their plans to encourage journalists to write negative stories about Lively, while simultaneously flooding social media with unflattering comments and making them seem organic — a tactic known as astroturfing.

“We can bury anyone,” Nathan wrote to Abel in an Aug. 2 text message, regarding their alleged plans. Two weeks later, after U.K. paper The Daily Mail ran a headline reading “Is Blake Lively Set to Be CANCELLED?” Abel wrote to Nathan, “You really outdid yourself with this piece.”

Baldoni’s lawyer Freedman, who also represents Heath, Sarowitz and Wayfarer and the publicists, claimed Lively filed the complaint to “fix her negative reputation.” He said the messages were “internal scenario planning” and the publicists did nothing out of the ordinary: “That’s what crisis teams do, they protect their clients.”

Abel also spoke out in a Facebook post calling the messages in the complaint “cherry picked” while denying any astroturfing. “We didn’t have to implement anything because the internet was doing the work for us,” she wrote. (None of the publicists or Wayfarer executives responded to a request for further comment.)

The whole ordeal has been a nightmare for Lively, who shares children James, 10, Inez, 8, Betty, 5 and 22-month-old son Olin with Reynolds, 48. Behind closed doors, says the complaint, she has suffered “grief, fear, trauma, and extreme anxiety” in the alleged campaign’s aftermath.

She is seeking unspecified damages from Baldoni and Wayfarer for “intentional infliction of emotional distress” and “interference” in her other businesses, like her Blake Brown haircare company, which launched in early August and suffered a decline in sales by “56-78%” amid the bad press and negative social media comments, Lively’s lawyers claim. “The Baldoni-Wayfarer astroturfing campaign forced each of Ms. Lively’s businesses to go ‘dark’ on social media in August,” according to the complaint.

A Lively source says putting together the legal case has been painful but necessary work. “Blake along with her team have been working on this lawsuit for months. It’s truly been so ugly for her. And insanely stressful. She’s never dealt with anything like this before,” explains the source.

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What happens next? Lively’s legal team is currently evaluating her options while awaiting a decision from the California Civil Rights Department, which has 60 days to notify her if they will investigate the matter.

“If they find some barrier to it, a lot of times they’ll step in and try to mediate a solution with the employer,” says legal expert Gregory Doll, a California attorney who is not involved in the case. “If not, they’ll give her what’s called the right to sue letter, which means that she can go to court now and submit her claim there.”

If she does sue and she and Baldoni don’t settle beforehand, they’d head to a trial. “The most likely cases that don’t settle are the ones like this where it gets intensely personal between two people,” he notes.

Baldoni could countersue as well, something Doll says is very likely due to the bitter back and forth between the two legal teams:  “Based on what I have observed, it’s almost guaranteed that he will file a counterclaim,” he predicts.

But no matter what happens, Lively has a vast support system of family and friends who have her back — especially her husband.

“Ryan is always her rock,” says a Lively source, who adds that the actress has been focusing on her family after filing the complaint. ”For now, she’s said what needed to be said.”

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