Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni War Explodes With Dueling Lawsuits

Justin Baldoni’s promised legal action in retaliation for Blake Lively’s explosive complaint against him landed in the final hours of 2024. But, at least for now, his target is the media outlet that broke the story—and not Lively herself.

Within hours of Baldoni’s move, Lively filed her own lawsuit against Baldoni for sexual harassment and orchestrating a smear campaign against her. The actress also named Baldoni’s production company Wayfarer Studios, and his PR representatives, Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel, in the suit.

The director and star of It Ends With Us was among 10 plaintiffs who filed a suit on Tuesday against The New York Times for libel and false light invasion of privacy over a Dec. 21 article headlined “‘We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine”, Variety first reported.

Joining Baldoni in the lawsuit are the publicists Nathan and Abel, as well as the film’s producers, Jamey Heath and Steve Sarowitz.

The Times article, written by Megan Twohey, Mike McIntire and Julie Tate, painted a damning picture of Baldoni and his team, whom Lively has accused of perpetrating a “smear” campaign against her after she accused Baldoni of sexual misconduct on the set of their 2024 film.

Now, Baldoni is taking aim at the paper for allegedly “cherry-picking” facts and mischaracterizing what he claims was actually a “strategic and manipulative” smear campaign against him, using what he claims are false “sexual harassment allegations to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production.”

“The Times story relied almost entirely on Lively’s unverified and self-serving narrative, lifting it nearly verbatim while disregarding an abundance of evidence that contradicted her claims and exposed her true motives,” the suit adds.

In a statement to the Daily Beast, Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman said that the paper “cowered to the wants and whims of two powerful ‘untouchable’ Hollywood elites, disregarding journalistic practices and ethics once befitting of the revered publication by using doctored and manipulated texts and intentionally omitting texts which dispute their chosen PR narrative. In doing so, they pre-determined the outcome of their story, and aided and abetted their own devastating PR smear campaign designed to revitalize Lively’s self-induced floundering public image and counter the organic groundswell of criticism amongst the online public. The irony is rich.”

The Times is standing by its reporting, with a spokesperson issuing the following statement:

“The role of an independent news organization is to follow the facts where they lead. Our story was meticulously and responsibly reported. It 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. To date, Wayfarer Studios, Mr. Baldoni, the other subjects of the article and their representatives have not pointed to a single error. We published their full statement in response to the allegations in the article as well. We plan to vigorously defend against the lawsuit.”