There is a new development in the continuing battle between Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively. Baldoni's legal team released a series of videos from the set of It Ends With Us on Tuesday as they once again pushed back against Lively's claims of sexual harassment.
Earlier this month Lively sued Baldoni, the director and co-star of the film, for harassment and retaliation, accusing him of allegedly engaging in inappropriate and unwelcome behavior towards Lively during production.
One of the allegations involved Lively objecting to Baldoni's conduct during the filming of a slow dance scene, which was to be a montage with no sound recorded.
In the suit, she claimed that Baldoni "chose to let the camera roll and have them perform the scene, but did not act in character as Ryle; instead, he spoke to Ms. Lively out of character as himself." At one point, he allegedly "leaned forward and slowly dragged his lips from her ear and down her neck as he said, 'it smells so good.'"
In response to that specific claim, Baldoni's team released a nearly 10-minute video from May 2023 that shows three takes from the sequence, which they claim was all the footage that had been shot for the scene.
In a title card at the beginning of the video, Baldoni's team claims that "the scene in question was designed to show the two characters falling in love and longing to be close to one another. Both actors are clearly behaving well within the scope of the scene and with mutual respect and professionalism."
Lively's team responded to the footage in a statement shared with People on Tuesday, claiming that "every frame of the released footage corroborates, to the letter."
"The video shows Mr. Baldoni repeatedly leaning in toward Ms. Lively, attempting to kiss her, kissing her forehead, rubbing his face and mouth against her neck, flicking her lip with his thumb, caressing her, telling her how good she smells, and talking with her out of character. Every moment of this was improvised by Mr. Baldoni with no discussion or consent in advance, and no intimacy coordinator present," read the statement from Lively's legal team.
Baldoni countersued Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds last week. Regarding the incident in question, Baldoni claims that Lively was "consistently unable to take direction" and would talk out of character during the scene. He claims that he was called aside by producers, including Jamey Heath who is also being sued, "to express they can't capture the intended 'shot' because Lively wouldn't stop talking. He was instructed to somehow get her to stop."
Lively's team described the video as a "stunt."
Baldoni's team announced on January 21 that they planned to launch a website that will contain "all correspondence as well as relevant videos that quash her claims." ~Ryan Donahue