Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s legal battle has resulted in the Gossip Girl star’s texts to close friend Taylor Swift being put before the court.
The controversy surrounding the film It Ends With Us began in 2024 when Lively launched legal proceedings against the director, accusing him of sexual harassment on set.
Isabela Ferrer, 24 — who portrayed the younger version of Lively’s character Lily in the Coleen Hoover adaptation — also filed harassment claims against Baldoni.
Now, partially unsealed court documents have revealed texts between Swift, 35, and her friend, with the Down Bad singer branding Baldoni ‘a b***h’.
According to Baldoni’s lawyers: ‘She asked Swift to endorse the revised script she was proposing even without having read it.’
In one conversation, Lively, 38, discussed the ‘doofus director of my movie’ as she asked Swift to take a look at the script.
In response, the Cardigan singer, who was on her way to Lively’s home at the time, said she would ‘do anything for you!’
The A Simple Favour actress declared her friend was ‘so epically heroic today’, allegedly writing: ‘I kept remembering stuff- You making s*** up about me and lenses.
‘And referring to yourself as my doll. This clown falling for all of it. But also resisting it. You are the worlds absolute greatest friend ever.’
Lively’s team retorted that these messages were missing context and pointed to the actress’ testimony in which she said she had ‘sent Taylor the script on her way to my apartment because Justin was still there, and I asked her to read them.
‘I told her she didn’t have to, I didn’t want her to feel pressured to do that, but I hoped that she would.’
Script changes are part of Baldoni’s complaint, in which he claims Lively, who was also a producer, took over the film.
Early reports suggested the pair had clashed over his dismissal of her input, focusing solely on his vision for his character, even in the face of author Hoover’s suggestions.
Baldoni was then accused of making the set a ‘hostile working environment’, with a list of requirements allegedly created during filming, which included an intimacy co-ordinator being there at all times.
Lively later claimed he launched a smear campaign against her, with a bombshell New York Times article supporting this statement released in December 2024.
Ahead of this article’s release, Swift cuttingly wrote: ‘‘I think this b**** knows something is coming because he’s gotten out his tiny violin’.
Lawyers for Lively stated they were not discussing the article but that the text was real.
It wasn’t just the Grammy winner who Lively allegedly bad-mouthed Baldoni to, as she apparently called him a ‘chaotic clown’ to Ben Affleck.
In a text to the Gone Girl actor, she said: ‘I ended up rewriting and restructuring the entire script, I also ended up having to direct the movie via the chaotic clown ‘director’/actor/producer/ financier/studio head at the center’.
Other unsealed documents related to the film’s birth scene, in which Lively claimed the director forced her to ‘simulate nudity’, which had not been discussed previously.
Lively said she had asked for a hospital gown but she felt ‘forced to compromise and ultimately agreed to simulate nudity from below the chest down.’
The scene took several hours to film, with the actress ‘positioned on my back on a hospital bed, with my naked legs spread apart wide in stirrups, while non-essential crew passed by.’
She claimed a blanket was not always provided between takes and all she had was a ‘small, thin and flat piece of black fabric to cover my genitalia.’
‘I was extremely uncomfortable with the degree to which I was exposed during the Birth Scene, which felt violative and humiliating,’ said Lively.
‘That was amplified by having Baldoni’s best friend acting between my legs, and his other best friend and the Film’s financier visiting that day of all days.’
A summary lawsuit hearing is scheduled for January 22, with Swift not subpoenaed but listed as a potential witness.
A representative for the singer previously responded to Baldoni’s attempts to subpoena her, saying: ‘Taylor Swift never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film, she did not even see It Ends With Us until weeks after its public release, and was traveling around the globe during 2023 and 2024 headlining the biggest tour in history.
‘The connection Taylor had to this film was permitting the use of one song, My Tears Ricochet.’
They accused Baldoni’s side of using her name ‘to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case.’
Baldoni has denied allegations of harassment and retaliation, countersuing Lively for $400million but this was dismissed by a judge in June.
Metro has reached out to Swift, Lively and Baldoni’s teams for comment.
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