Blake Lively’s legal team have branded Justin Baldoni’s lawsuit “desperate” and “another chapter in the abuser playbook”.
Blake Lively’s legal team have branded Justin Baldoni’s lawsuit “desperate”.
The 37-year-old actress filed a lawsuit against her ‘It Ends with Us’ co-star and director, as well as his publicists and producing partners, on 20 December accusing him of sexual harassment and orchestrating a bid to tarnish her reputation, and now he has hit back by launching a lawsuit of his own, in which he is seeking $400 million damages.
Justin – who previously took legal action against the New York Times newspaper for its reporting on the claims Blake made in her lawsuit – is suing the ‘Gossip Girl’ star, her husband Ryan Reynolds and their publicist for etortion and defamation, as well as false light invasion of privacy, breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, intentional interference with contractual relations, intentional interference with prospective economic advantage, and negligent interference with prospective economic advantage, and in response, the actress’ team branded the move “another chapter in the abuser playbook”.
Her lawyers said in a statement: “This latest lawsuit from Justin Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios, and its associates is another chapter in the abuser playbook. 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.
“Wayfarer has opted to use the resources of its billionaire co-founder to issue media statements, launch meritless lawsuits, and threaten litigation to overwhelm the public’s ability to understand that what they are doing is retaliation against 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. The evidence will also show that Sony asked Ms. Lively to oversee Sony’s cut of the film, which they then selected for distribution and was a resounding 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. 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.”
Upon filing the lawsuit, Justin’s team insisted they had “an overwhelming amount” of evidence to prove their side of the story.
His lawyer, Bryan Freedman, said: “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. Blake Lively was either severely misled by her team or intentionally and knowingly misrepresented the truth.”
The lawyer added that Blake “attempted to bulldoze reputations” with her recent media campaign and insisted that his client has “nothing to hide” with his choice to take it all to court.
He said: “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.”
Blake Lively’s team slam Justin Baldoni’s ‘desperate’ lawsuit
