Law&Crime Sidebar - 13 Shocking Details in Blake Lively's Sexual Harassment Complaint

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

The drama surrounding It Ends With Us has taken a shocking turn after Blake Lively filed a bombshell legal complaint against her co-star and director, Justin Baldoni, accusing him of sexual harassment, retaliation, and more. This explosive filing reveals allegations of a toxic environment on set, a damaging smear campaign, and serious misconduct that Lively claims was covered up by Baldoni and his associates. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber dives into the most jaw-dropping claims from the legal action.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:If your child, under 21, has been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or fatty liver disease, visit https://forthepeople.com/food to start a claim now!HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger and Christina FalconeScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. View Shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that will

keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. The legal war has begun. The reports of a feud between actress Blake Lively and her co-star director Justin Baldoni on the set of the movie, It Ends With Us, have now materialized into a legal complaint that alleges sexual harassment, misconduct, and a smear campaign against lively. We are going to break down the main claims in this legal action right now. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by law and crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Hey, so before we go any further into this, this is actually really scary,

but did you know that children are being diagnosed with serious conditions like type 2 diabetes and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease? and the research is potentially linking ultra-processed foods to this? Yeah, so Morgan and Morgan is stepping in to fight to hold these food companies accountable. With decades of experience fighting large corporations, they are ready to stand up for families who deserve justice. So if your child under 21 has been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or fatty liver disease, visit www.forthepeople.com slash food to learn more.

I don't know if you've been following the drama surrounding the movie. It ends with us, but it was widely reported. on social media and the media that there were all of these problems between actress Blake Lively and her co-star director of the film Justin Baldoni. You might have seen things like this, articles, headlines, rumors, speculation, and we really couldn't get quite to the bottom of what exactly was going on here. And as you'll see, there may be a reason for that because now, my gosh, Lively has just filed a bombshell legal action against Baldoni.

and others, claiming, among other things, sexual harassment, retaliation, invasion of privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The bottom line here is that Baldoni and others were engaging in severe misconduct, and when lively reported it, she was retaliated against, and a smear campaign was launched against her. It is such an apparent damaging complaint that she just filed that Baldoni was reportedly dropped from his talent agency. Morris Endeavor WME over the weekend. Now to be clear, this is not a lawsuit yet. This is a complaint that was filed with the California Civil Rights Department. It's my understanding that under

California law, you need to first file this action there before being able to actually file a lawsuit, particularly filing in federal court under Title VII, and that centers around employment discrimination. So there's a procedural step that has to be taken before you can actually file a lawsuit. Now, she is not only naming Baldoni in this action. She is also naming Wayfair Studios who owns the film. This is a company that's actually co-founded by Baldoni. Jamie Heath, this is the company's CEO. Steve Sarowitz, another co-founder. Jennifer Abel and Melissa Nathan, two important names here, these crisis

management and PR executives, and other companies and individuals who she claims acted in bad faith. Now, Melissa Nathan, let's just talk about her real quick. She is apparently a renowned crisis management expert actually represented Johnny Depp, Drake, Travis Scott, so she is renowned in this area. Her name is going to be coming up a lot here. So I'm going to break down this complaint for you, but something to keep in mind. As I read you these alleged messages and communications that are arguably quite damning, you might be saying, how does Lively have all this?

Well, apparently, she issued a subpoena for all of these communications before filing this complaint. And since there are no attorneys on these communications, privilege cannot be claimed. This is fair game to see and use. That could be quite an issue for Mr. Baldoni and the other defendants, because let's get into this. So I think the most appropriate place to start is how this complaint starts, because it begins literally in the middle. It says how on January 4th that prior to resuming filming on it ends with us, which began production in May of 2023, but was suspended due to the writer's story. strike, there was this all hands meeting. And this meeting was to address some allegedly concerning issues of sexual harassment

during this production. So at the meeting was Baldoni, Heath, a representative for Sony Pictures, which was the company that was distributing the film, other producers on the film, Blake Lively, and she brought us her representative, her actor, husband, Ryan Reynolds. And according to Lively, she not only brought up her concerns, but the concerns of other female cast and crew. In fact, to give you a sense of what we're talking about here, what was addressed or allegedly addressed at this meeting, the complaint says that all the parties agreed that the following list of misconduct would stop and it's embedded in this lawsuit.

And that included no more showing nude videos or images of women to lively and or employees, no more mention of Baldoni or Heath's previous pornography addiction, no more joking with lively about their genitalia, no more discussion with lively about her, sex life, no more adding of sex scenes that go beyond the script, no more private multi-hour meetings and Lively's trailer where Baldoni is crying. Yeah, that's what we're talking about here. So there were 30 points in this list. And apparently all the parties agreed to make the changes so that the film could be completed, marketed, and released safely and successfully. By the way, talking about success, leave the film made, what, $350 million at the world.

worldwide box office when it was released in August of 2024. Now, the complaint says that lively promoted this film, as she was contractually obligated to do, but the marketing plan was to promote the film a little bit differently, was to promote the film, more specifically her character, Lily Bloom, about her strength, her resilience, make it about hope, and not really focus on the darker theme of domestic violence and make this set. Now Baldoni, the complaint says pivoted away from that marketing plan, particularly why. Why was he separate from lively and others? Well, because apparently many of the film's cast and crew seemingly unfollowed Baldoni on social media. In fact, it's alleged that in advance of the release of

this film, nearly all the cast members chose to appear in public separately from Baldoni, all because of what he allegedly did on that staff. By the way, that included the author of the book, too, from which this movie is based, Colleen Hoover. So there needed to be a way for Baldoni and his team to explain this, right? And what the complaint alleges was this was really the beginning of an overall plan that Baldoni and his team, particularly Abel, Wayfarer, Nathan, and her company, the agency group PR LLC, what they did was socially manipulate and destroy Lively's reputation in an effort to make sure that none of these allegations became public.

That is the central allegation in this complaint. So Baldoni allegedly sends a text, and it's listed in this complaint. This is one of many texts that are listed in this complaint. And this one read, we should have a plan for if she does the same when movie comes out. Plans make me feel more at ease. Now, the natural conclusion would be, if Blake lively comes out with these allegations about what was happening on the set, we have to find a way to counter it. Although I will say, I think the complaint makes it pretty clear that this was an unfounded concern, because according to Lively, neither her nor others in the cast actually publicly disclosed this misconduct on the set or suggested to waive Farrow or Baldoni or anyone that they intended to go public with what was going on on that set or allegedly going on that set. And by the way, when I say social manipulation, there was an alleged conversation that actually brought this up.

It makes a distinction between social manipulation and social media mitigation. Two different things here in the PR world. And there's, again, a message of communication about that. But to give you an idea of the concerns that these parties may have had about lively and others coming forward, Abel apparently texted Heath. We can't have fans starting to guess why J.B., Justin Baldoni, is left out of this stuff. By the way, there's even a claim in this complaint that Sarowitz, allegedly said he was prepared to spend $100 million to ruin Blake Lively.

So the complaint alleges that Baldoni retained Nathan, this crisis communication specialist. And it appears Nathan sent Baldoni a proposal about starting threads of theories, creating social fan engagement, to change a narrative, and to make sure, quote, all of this will be most importantly untraceable. And this was, again, all to counter any negative stories about Baldoni. The complaint reads, this plan went well beyond standard crisis PR. What Ms. Nathan proposed included a practice known as astroturfing, which has been defined as the practice of publishing opinions or comments on the internet and the media, etc, that appear to come from ordinary members of the public, but actually come from a particular company. Furthermore, Ms. Nathan's plan proposed strategies to advance misleading counter-narratives, including pushing Nathan's narrative that Ms. Lively had, quote, less than favorable representation.

reputation, proposing to explore planting stories about the weaponization of feminism and misleadingly blaming Ms. Lively for production members' job losses, so putting the blame and the focus and negative attention on her. And there was also this apparent circulation of this scenario planning document, and it provides Nathan's company's, quote, recommendation to get ahead of this narrative, and this included suggesting misleading messages that production members lost their jobs due to to take over and insisted upon involvement, that Ms. Lively involved her husband to create an imbalance of power between her and others, that Ms. Lively had a less than favorable reputation in the

industry, that Ms. Lively had a clear, likely motive to bully her way and to buying the rights for it. It starts with us. That's the sequel. And there was even an allegation in this complaint that Baldoni didn't think this campaign was aggressive enough. The complaint reads, and again, this is actually based on a text message embedded in the complaint. It says, to Mr. Heath and Ms. Abel, Baldoni said he was not in love with the document they sent. Not sure I'm feeling the protection I felt on the call. And this is a call with Ms. Nathan and her colleagues. And then Mr. Heath wrote at one point, the most important part of this is how quickly they can

shut things down and place stories in your favor. The complaint reads later that day, Ms. Abel and Ms. Nathan exchanged the following text messages, expressing that Mr. Baldoni wants to feel like can be buried, wants to feel like she can be buried. And then Ms. Abel and Ms. Nathan agreed that, of course, they would do just that, but could not say so in writing. We can't write it down to him. We can't write. We will destroy her. Imagine if a document saying all the things that he wants ends up in the wrong hands. So Nathan allegedly responded, you know we can bury anyone, but I can't write that to him. These are bad messages. Or how about this? August 4th, Ms. Abel texted Nathan. Again, there's an embedded screenshot of this text.

stating, I'm having reckless thoughts of wanting to plant pieces this week of how horrible Blake is to work with just to get ahead of it. Let's go to August 5th, 2024. So this is when Baldoni is trying to set the narrative for this social media campaign. And what he does is he sends Abel a screenshot of a threat on X. And this was about another celebrity, a female celebrity who was accused of bullying women. And Mr. Baldoni states, this is what we would need. And the complaint, alleges that in the weeks and the months that followed at Wayfair and Baldoni's direction and approval, this team engaged in a sophisticated, coordinated, and well-financed retaliation plan. And this included retaining a subcontractor named Jed Wallace, who, quote, weaponized

a digital army. And this is one that would look like real and authentic social media accounts and internet chat forum conversations, but really, it was manufactured. And this would also include feeding information to reporters, too. And based on this complaint, it worked. In fact, there's this message from Melissa Nathan to Jennifer Abel that says, the majority of socials are so pro-justin, and I don't even agree with half of them, LLL. And the two talked about how lucky Baldoni was seemingly to be able to shut down these negative stories about him and simultaneously, seemingly destroy Blake Lively's character, change the narrative

against her. When it came to suppressing bad stories about Baldoni, there were some articles that started to come out. But in a text message, Abel wrote Nathan, I can tell you've done a lot of work here. Nothing about being unsafe, fat comments, sexual.

And I'll get to what these, what happened on the set in a minute. Okay, I'll get into that a minute. But in my opinion, that seems to suggest that those comments and those episodes, either did really happen during the production, or they were at least brought up and asserted and alleged and reported by Blake Lively and others. So again, based on this text message, gives more credence to Lively's allegations, which again, I'll get into in a minute. And then let me go to this,

August 15, 2024. Melissa Nathan remarked, this went so well, it was genius. So, okay, we have the four major standing down on HR complaint. Or how about this, August 16, Ms. Nathan circulated a daily mail article entitled, is Blake lively set to be canceled? String of hard to watch videos that have surfaced following tone deaf Q&A to promote it ends with us could tarnish 36-year-old star's golden Hollywood image for good. To which Ms. Abel responded, wow, you really outdid yourself with this piece. And Ms. Nathan replied, or allegedly replied, that's why you hired me, right? I'm the best. That is why, by the way, I mentioned before the part where Lively said she was promoting the film in a different way than Baldoni may have seen

it. And the idea is to suggest she wasn't tone deaf in these interviews, but really there was a different marketing plan and how to frame the film differently. And I just want to highlight another text between Nathan and Abel, where Nathan allegedly writes Abel, socials are really, really ramping up in his favor. She must be furious. It's actually said because it just shows you how people really want to hate on women. So all in all, the allegations were that there were efforts to suppress negative stories about Baldoni, including those that said lively was uncomfortable on set, create mixed messaging so as to confuse people as to what was really happening between lively on Baldoni. And there were even texts from Nathan to Abel like, we survived. And I really

think the worst is over. And that Baldoni won't be canceled. And just to focus a bit more on how there was this alleged effort to paint lively in a negative light. For example, one part of the complaint focuses upon the crafting of this article that was published for page six, and this was shared on Reddit and social media, and it prompted a lot of negative reactions towards Blake lively because it created a narrative that she steamrolled or bulldozed Baldoni in the film for, quote, her own personal gain, and essentially by controlling too many aspects of what was going on.

so victimizing Baldoni. The complaint reads, Ms. Lively was criticized for how she was marketing the film. She was repeatedly called a bully, a mean girl, and controlling, and was criticized for allegedly marginalizing Mr. Baldoni.

The Wayfair team seeded social media content into publications with small audiences and lax editorial standards and then fed those posts and or articles to publications like page 6, Newsweek, New York Post, TMZ, and BuzzFeed. These publications have larger audiences

in greater reach, which significantly amplified the negative sentiment toward Ms. Lively. And as part of this spike in negative commentary, one of the things that also popped up during this time were old interviews of Blake Lively, where she was accused of being rude or attacking reporters, including one of which a reporter comments on her baby bump when she was pregnant, and then she comments back to the reporter saying, oh, about her bump. In fact, that interview on YouTube is titled,

the Blake Lively interview that made me want to quit my job. It's from entertainment reporter Christy Flah. And just a little side note about that. There are allegations, of course, that the defendants took deliberate steps to put out specific negative information and commentary. But it's also not clear how much it was also people just coming forward and adding on to this and piling on and coming out with their own experiences, their own interpretations, their own opinions of Blake Lively and doing their own digging on her, putting their own stuff out there.

How much this was just being amplified? So, you know, it does become a question there. And also, I will say, while the text conversations apparently show the launching of this digital PR war against Blake Lively, the actual specifics of how this happened on social media and in social media forums or chat forums, that's something that wasn't entirely clear from this complaint. But if this litigation continues, maybe that's something that would come out. But when it comes to the defendants, it wasn't just an alleged targeting at Blake Lively. This complaint also says that it targets her husband, Ryan Reynolds. So there's a text message from Baldoni to Nathan and Abel regarding, quote, flipping the narrative about Ryan saying script was a disaster and he saved the movie to making him look like an anti-feminist. So Baldoni, again, allegedly directing this campaign against Blake Lively and now Ryan Reynolds.

And all in all, this severely hurt Blake Lively and her businesses, according to this complaint. The complaint reads millions of people, including many reporters and influencers who saw these planted stories, social media posts, and other online content had no idea they were unwitting consumers of a crisis PR, astroturfing, and digital retaliation campaign created and funded by Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer to hurt Ms. Lively. And you know what? I honestly remember seeing all of this. You might have seen it as well. I remember seeing a lot of this negative press and articles and online. commentary about Blake lively and during this time, I remember that. Now these allegations put a different take on all of this. And this complaint talks about the harm because the complaint explains that when Lively launched her hair care line, Blake Brown in 2024, the Instagram account was flooded with harassing and derogatory comments like this one. How about you stop paying the media to trash and smear Justin? That would be a good start, you awful human being. And she also

claim she had to cancel appearances, including on SNL, that she suffered mentally, physically, professionally, including her other brands suffered, Betty Buzz and Betty Booze. And this may make up the interference with prospective economic advantage claim in this complaint, because that's when a defendant improperly gets in the way of a business relationship that probably would have provided an economic benefit to the plaintiff. So now that's the main crux, right? But we got to take a step back. And now we have to address what exactly were the allegations of sexual harassment during this production that seemingly Baldoni and his team were so nervous was going to get out. And by the way, lively asserts that Baldoni and Heath, they quote, held all leadership

positions on this production and answered to no one. So essentially we're talking about an employer here, right? So when we talk about the sexual harassment claim in this complaint under California and federal law. It is illegal to harass an employee providing services. And an employer has to take all reasonable steps to prevent harassment. And sexual harassment doesn't even have to be motivated by sexual desire, by the way. It's about creating this hostile work environment. So first, there are allegations that Wayfair and Baldoni essentially disregarded the rules and Lively's contract regarding intimacy scenes. The bottom line is with intimacy scenes. they need to be consensual and they need to be planned out.

And here, to give you an example, the complaint reads, Mr. Baldoni improvised physical intimacy that had not been rehearsed, choreographed, or discussed with Ms. Lively, with no intimacy coordinator involved. For instance, Mr. Baldoni discreetly bit and sucked on Ms. Lively's lower lip during a scene in which he improvised numerous kisses on each take. Or how about this? There was another allegation that he filmed a slow dance scene with Blake Lively,

and then started talking to her out of character, and then whispered to her as he dragged his lips from her ears to her neck, it smells so good. And there was also another alarming allegation when Baldoni allegedly tried to add this certain kind of sex scene to the script. And then he started allegedly asking lively about her sex life. And then there was this incident regarding the birth scene in the film. So lively claims on the day of shooting this scene, Baldoni and Heath pressured her to simulate full nudity. She says nothing like that was in the script, her contract, in any of the discussions that they had.

But they end up filming this scene, and she says the set was just chaotic. There was no choreographing with an intimacy coordinator. They didn't close the set, according to her, meaning that non-essential crew just were walking by. And even Baldoni had his, quote, best friend play the part of the OBGYN. She said that this was invasive and humiliating. And she also claims that Heath showed her a video of a naked woman with her legs spread apart, possibly in a way to make her feel more comfortable on the issue of a nude birth.

There were also allegations that Baldoni and Heath shared personal details about their lives, that Baldoni claimed he was sexually abused, that he didn't always ask for consent, that they would talk about their sex lives. They would talk about their, quote, previous pornography addictions. And at one point, Baldoni allegedly claimed he could speak to the dead, including his dead father. By the way, regarding the pornography, Lively claims in this complaint that when Baldoni referenced porn to her, she allegedly said to him privately that she had never seen it.

And then he later revealed to the cast and crew that Lively had, quote, never seen porn. And it seems that this and the allegations that Heath and Baldoni would walk into her makeup trailer uninvited while she was undressed, this all makes up the invasion of privacy claim in her complaint too. Actually, that is a right to privacy that is enshrined in the California Constitution. Moreover, there were allegations that Baldoni objectified women, including on the production, referring to them as sexy and commenting on their outfits. In fact, lively claims that another cast member lodged a sexual harassment complaint against Baldoni in May of 2023. When you remember that allegation I mentioned before about Baldoni crying in Blake

Lively's trailer? Well, the complaint reads on the second day of filming, for example, Mr. Baldoni made the rest of the cast and crew wait for hours while he cried a Ms. Lively's dressing room, claiming social media commentators were saying that Ms. Lively looked old and unattractive based on paparazzi photos from the set. She tried to reassure him that she should look authentic in the scenes depicted in the photos, which were just after her character had been abused by her fictional husband rather than hot. Mr. Baldoni, however, appeared focused on Ms. Lively's sexual appeal above all else. His lengthy outburst caused a delay in shooting, forcing an emotional scene to be shot haphazardly. By the way, she also claimed that Baldoni had called her trainer

without her permission to try to get her to lose weight. So all of this is going on, according to her, and Lively claims that Wayfarer failed to provide any employment protections. They didn't investigate any of these HR-related issues, and I believe this makes up one of the central claims in this complaint as well, where an employer has a duty to resolve and remedy harassment issues. Then there's this section in the complaint that revolves around how the parties negotiated this contract writer regarding Baldoni and Heath's alleged conduct. I'm not going to get too technical with it, but the gist of it is, is that Lively wanted to address and resolve these problems on set before production returned after the strike, so Lively tried to get Wayfaird to

agree to all of these points moving forward. And one of these points was, quote, there shall be no retaliation of any kind against for raising concerns about the conduct described in this letter or for these requirements. Any changes in attitudes, sarcasm, marginalization, or other negative behavior, including onset or otherwise, including during publicity and promotional work as a result of these requests is retaliatory and unacceptable and will be met with immediate action. And even though Baldoni and Heath, according to this complaint, seem to agree to all the points, it seems to me that this is a breach of contract claim. That's why it's listed in this complaint, because as I mentioned before, she claims they all retaliated against her. By the way,

retaliation in and of itself is illegal under employment law too. That is one of the causes of action in this complaint as well. Now, with all that being said, this is one of the final points of the complaint. It reads, through this complaint, Ms. Live, seeks to set the record straight, to hold the wayfarer parties and associates accountable, and to shine a light on the new form of retaliation so that it will not be used against any others who seek to stand up and speak out against sexual harassment. And in a statement to filing this complaint, Ms. Lively said, 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. Now, Baldoni's attorney, Brian Friedman, released a to the New York Times, saying it is shameful that Ms. Lively and representatives would make such serious and categorically false accusations against Mr. Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios, and its representatives and assured that the studio, its Xex, and PR reps did nothing proactive nor retaliated against Lively and said this was just, quote, another desperate attempt to fix her negative reputation. Now, interestingly, Friedman didn't seem to address the alleged misconduct allegations during the production, but really focusing on the allegations of what happened afterwards. But Freeman also said that Lively had put out these, quote, negative and completely fabricated

and false stories with the media about Baldoni. And that was the reason why Wayfarer hired this crisis management expert, that it was not something nefarious, but he was acting on the defense. So let's see where this all shakes up. But again, this could be the start of a new, long legal battle. That's all we have for you right now here on sidebar. Thank you so much for joining us. As always, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts.

I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. Thank you.