How the stars of the series “It’s over with us” ignited a world of legal and PR battles

The dispute between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, the heroes of the movie “It’s over with us”, has become a working program for lawyers and flexors.

Lively was proposed last month. allegations of sexual harassment and retaliation with the California Department of Civil Rights against Baldoni, his partner and director; his company, Wayfarer Studios; and several others. Her complaint alleges, among other things, that Baldoni repeatedly molested her in intimate scenes in the multimillion-dollar film based on Colleen Hoover’s best-selling novel about a sweet, gentle flower shop owner who falls for a charming but abusive neurosurgeon. .

Lively claims she required a long list of precautions, including the presence of an “intimacy coordinator” during her scenes, and that Baldoni refrained from “biting and sucking lips” without her consent. Fearful that the news would become public and defame her, Lively claims, Baldoni’s team mounted a smear campaign against her with the help of a hit man. Jed Wallace. Her company, Street Relations, is accused of orchestrating a social media campaign against Lively that allegedly led to a barrage of negative stories about her, according to a brand marketing firm employed by Lively.

Later, the newspaper “New York Times” was published. explosive story titled We Can Bury Anyone: Inside the Hollywood Bullying Machine is based on thousands of private messages between Baldoni and his team about an apparent attempt to “smear” Lively after she was accused of misconduct. (How did The Times get its hands on the treasure? It’s the subject of yet another claim between rival PR firms.)

On the other hand, the Times has a response from Baldoni’s attorney. He categorically denies the claims: “These allegations,” he said, “are completely false, outrageous and intentionally offensive.”

On New Year’s Eve, Baldoni and others filed a $250 million defamation lawsuit against the New York Times, which it claims deliberately omitted the real source of the conflict between Lively and Baldoni: “Lively’s deliberate and brazen attempt to take control of the film.” (The film’s distributor, Sony Pictures, used Lively’s editing of the film and gave her a production credit at the behest of Baldoni and his business partner Jamie Heath. A letter accompanying Baldoni’s lawsuit says this was done to keep the peace.) The The New York Times promised a “vigorous” defense.

Also on New Year’s Eve, a revived federal lawsuit was filed in New York that repeats many of the allegations from the California complaint.

Baldoni’s lawyer. He told NBC News on Friday that his client plans to sue Lively and release “all the text messages” to prove her account is false.

Hollywood news site Deadline announced that the story “shows some of how the sausage of a popular PR machine is really made in the age of influencers and media.”

At least for now, Lively seems to have won the PR battle. Baldoni was dropped by his agency WME, which also represents Lively’s husband Ryan Reynolds.

As a journalist who occasionally writes about Hollywood, I am aware of the unholy alliance between reporters and Hollywood elephants who tempt them to abandon their ethics in exchange for access and information. (And you can easily replace the word “politics” with “Hollywood”.)

According to Blake’s complaint, crisis PR expert Melissa Nathan wrote that she was friends with the reporter, who writes for People, Fox News, In Touch Weekly and Us Weekly, and said the reporter was “ready to pick up on Blake’s gun story.” . feminism”. every time we give it the green light.”

It got on my nerves. A few years ago I was approached by a senior PR executive who had worked for Angelina Jolie for a year. her long divorce from Brad Pitt. Am I interested in writing a column (based on inside information, of course) about how Jolie was mistreated by a legal system that was against women? The very notion of Jolie (rich, privileged, and famous) as a victim didn’t make sense to me, and I had little interest in letting her, yes, use feminism as a weapon in her legal battle with Pitt.

But I digress.

Baldoni has presented herself as an enlightened feminist for many years. In 2017, a month after the #MeToo movement exploded into the public consciousness, he gave a TED talk titled “Why I Stopped Trying to Be Human.”

“Are you brave enough to be vulnerable?” asked. “Are you strong enough to be sensitive? Do you have the confidence to listen to the women in your life?”

In December, while on the film’s promotional tour, he told The Hollywood Reporter that he had been sexually assaulted in college and was in “excruciating pain” after filming “We’re Over” “because it hurt so much.” She also revealed that she was recently diagnosed with ADHD, which Lively claims her publicists can blame for her allegedly sexual behavior on set.

Meanwhile, the movie… Oh yes, the movie! – which cost $25 million, grossed $351 million worldwide.

It seems that everyone involved cried all the way to the bank.

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