It’s not ending.
Blake Vigorous has responded to Justin Baldoni’s $400 million lawsuit in opposition to his “It Ends With Us” co-star.
Baldoni, 40, is suing Vigorous, 37, her husband, Ryan Reynolds, 48, their publicist Leslie Sloane and Sloane’s p.r. agency Imaginative and prescient PR Inc. over the ongoing “It Ends With Us” saga, which facilities on Vigorous’s allegations of sexual harassment in opposition to Baldoni.
The go well with — filed Thursday within the Southern District of New York by Baldoni’s attorneys on behalf of the “Jane the Virgin” star, “It Ends With Us” producer Jamey Heath, publicist Jennifer Abel and disaster publicist Melissa Nathan — claims Vigorous took sure measures to achieve management over the 2024 movie.
Attorneys for Vigorous have issued a response to the grievance, claiming his accusations are “retaliation against sexual harassment allegations.”
“This latest lawsuit from Justin Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios, and its associates is another chapter in the abuser playbook,” Vigorous’s authorized workforce stated in an announcement to The Put up.
“This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim. This is what experts call DARVO. Deny. Attack. Reverse Victim Offender.”
The assertion continued, “Wayfarer has opted to make use of the assets of its billionaire co-founder to subject media statements, launch meritless lawsuits, and threaten litigation to overwhelm the general public’s means to know that what they’re doing is retaliation in opposition to sexual harassment allegations.
“They are trying to shift the narrative to Ms. Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr. Baldoni. The evidence will show that the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer,” Vigorous’s attorneys added. “The proof will even present that Sony requested Ms. Vigorous to supervise Sony’s lower of the movie, which they then chosen for distribution and was a powerful success.
“Their response to sexual harassment allegations: she wanted it, it’s her fault. Their justification for why this happened to her: look what she was wearing,” the assertion continued. “In short, while the victim focuses on the abuse, the abuser focuses on the victim. The strategy of attacking the woman is desperate, it does not refute the evidence in Ms. Lively’s complaint, and it will fail.”
In Baldoni’s 179-page grievance obtained by The Put up, he accuses Vigorous, Reynolds and their associates of civil extortion, defamation, false gentle invasion of privateness, breach of implied covenant of excellent religion and truthful dealing, intentional interference with contractual relations, intentional interference with potential financial benefit, and negligent interference with potential financial benefit.
“Lively began inserting herself into the production process in intrusive ways well beyond the scope of her contractual entitlement,” Baldoni’s submitting reads. “For example, Lively began to insist on creative control over her character’s wardrobe. While lead actors are sometimes granted approval over their characters’ general look, they generally do not receive full control over.”
Baldoni’s legal professional, Bryan Freedman, stated in an announcement, “This lawsuit is a legal action based on an overwhelming amount of untampered evidence detailing Blake Lively and her team’s duplicitous attempt to destroy Justin Baldoni, his team and their respective companies by disseminating grossly edited, unsubstantiated, new and doctored information to the media.”
“It is clear based on our own all out willingness to provide all complete text messages, emails, video footage and other documentary evidence that was shared between the parties in real time, that this is a battle she will not win and will certainly regret,” he added. “Blake Lively was either severely misled by her team or intentionally and knowingly misrepresented the truth.”
Freedman concluded: “Let’s not forget, Ms. Lively and her team attempted to bulldoze reputations and livelihoods for heinously selfish reasons through their own dangerous manipulation of the media before even taking any actual legal action. We know the truth, and now the public does too. Justin and his team have nothing to hide, documents do not lie.”
Baldoni’s $400 million authorized motion follows a civil rights grievance and lawsuit Vigorous filed in opposition to the actor-director in December, alleging he sexually harassed her on the set of “It Ends With Us” with inappropriate feedback. The “Gossip Girl” alum additionally claimed Baldoni orchestrated a public smear marketing campaign to smash her fame.
Vigorous first revealed her allegations in opposition to Baldoni in an interview with the New York Instances. The Instances was subsequently sued by Baldoni, who accused the newspaper of promissory fraud and breach of implied-in-fact contract in his $250 million lawsuit.
A spokesperson for the Instances informed the Put up, “The position of an unbiased information group is to comply with the info the place they lead. Our story was meticulously and responsibly reported. It was based mostly on a evaluation of 1000’s of pages of authentic paperwork, together with the textual content messages and emails that we quote precisely and at size within the article. To this point, Wayfarer Studios, Mr. Baldoni, the opposite topics of the article and their representatives haven’t pointed to a single error. We revealed their full assertion in response to the allegations within the article as effectively.
“We plan to vigorously defend against the lawsuit.”
