It Ends With Us actor and director Justin Baldoni has released outtakes from the filming of the drama, amid legal battles with co-star Blake Lively. Lively sued Baldoni in December, accusing him of “inappropriate and unwelcome behaviour” and claiming he was trying to “destroy” her reputation.
READ MORE: Sony Pictures “firmly reiterates” support for Blake Lively amid Justin Baldoni allegations
Baldoni has denied all accusations, and countersued January 16, including Lively’s husband Ryan Reynolds and publicist Leslie Sloane in the suit. The filing claims to have come about due to “overwhelming amount of untampered evidence detailing Blake Lively and her team’s duplicitous attempt to destroy Justin Baldoni, his team and their respective companies”.
In December, Baldoni sued The New York Times, which reported Lively’s allegations. In a statement to US outlet NPR, the newspaper said they “plan to vigorously defend against the lawsuit”.
Today (January 22), Baldoni released the video to MailOnline. Running at just under ten minutes, it begins with the following statement on-screen: “Ms. Lively’s complaint alleged that during a scene Mr. Baldoni and Ms. Lively were filming for a slow dance montage, Mr. Baldoni was behaving inappropriately”.
It continues: “The following videos were captured on May 23, 2023, clearly refute Ms. Lively’s characterisation of his behaviour. 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. These are all three takes filmed of the sequence”.
Highlights of the first take of the video include the pair dancing and talking, as well as discussing which movements would be appropriate for the scene as they act out their character’s dance (as the scene is part of a montage, no sound is recorded). They debate whether it is better for their characters to talk or kiss, with Lively preferring talking to avoid having a kiss between the characters too soon. At one point, Baldoni nuzzles Lively’s neck, to which she responds that talking is “more romantic”.
After discussing a close up, in the next take Baldoni appears to kiss Lively’s neck before saying “am I getting beard on you today?” She laughs before replying: “I’m probably getting spray tan on you”. He again nuzzles the other side of her neck and says: “It smells good”. She responds: “Well, it’s not that, it’s my body make-up”. A third take focuses on their feet and bodies during the dance.
In a statement to MailOnline, Lively’s representatives claimed that the video vindicates their comments. It read: “Justin Baldoni and his lawyer may hope that this latest stunt will get ahead of the damaging evidence against him, but the video itself is damning”.
Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds at the ‘It Ends With Us’ premiere (John Nacion/Variety via Getty Images)
The statement continued by alleging that the clip “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”.
Referring to the original case, the statement said: “every frame of the released footage corroborates, to the letter, what Ms. Lively described in Paragraph 48 of her Complaint”, adding “every moment of this was improvised by Mr. Baldoni with no discussion or consent in advance, and no intimacy coordinator present”.
The statement concluded by claiming: “Mr. Baldoni was not only Ms. Lively’s co-star, but the director, the head of studio and Ms. Lively’s boss. Any woman who has been inappropriately touched in the workplace will recognize Ms. Lively’s discomfort. They will recognize her attempts at levity to try to deflect the unwanted touching. No woman should have to take defensive measures to avoid being touched by their employer without their consent”.
The suits have brought about a variety of speculation online, with theories surrounding the meaning behind the character of Nicepool in Deadpool & Wolverine. Elsewhere, Lively’s A Simple Favour director, Paul Peig, denied rumours that the star derailed the sequel.
The post ‘It Ends With Us’ star Justin Baldoni releases outtakes from film, Blake Lively responds appeared first on NME.