Final summer time, the It Ends With Us solid and crew had been embroiled in a feud, in response to a number of studies. It began when TikTok customers observed that movie star Blake Energetic and her co-star and director, Justin Baldoni, didn’t pose for footage collectively on the August 6, 2024, New York Metropolis premiere. Rumors surfaced claiming that the solid distanced themselves from Justin, and gas was added to the hearth when Justin employed a disaster PR supervisor. On the finish of 2024, Blake filed a lawsuit in opposition to Justin for alleged sexual harassment on the set of their film. In early 2025, Justin responded by suing each Blake and her husband, Ryan Reynolds.
Hollywood Life is breaking down the timeline between the drama and the authorized battle between Blake and Justin, beneath.
Rumors of Pressure Flow into
On August 14, 2024, TMZ reported that there was discomfort between Blake and Justin whereas filming a kissing scene. Insiders instructed the outlet that the A Easy Favor actress felt that the director “lingered” too lengthy whereas kissing her on digicam.
Sources additionally instructed the outlet that Blake felt “fat-shamed” by Justin whereas engaged on a scene through which his character, Ryle, lifts her character, Lilly, into the air. Justin reportedly has a historical past of again points, and after he allegedly requested an on-set coach how a lot Blake weighed, she felt that he was fat-shaming her, in response to the outlet.
Web page Six reported that an eyewitness recalled “stress” seen in Blake on the set of It Ends With Us.
“The strain was so apparent,” the supply instructed the outlet. “As soon as [Blake] was accomplished with the scene, she was actually impatient, mentioned, ‘Am I accomplished? Can I’m going?’ and as quickly as they mentioned, ‘Sure,’ there was like a Blake-size gap within the wall [sic]. She was so outta there.”
Followers had been asking whether or not or not Blake and Justin would work on the sequel, It Begins With Us. Nevertheless, a supply instructed Selection on August 27, 2024, that there’s “no world the place these two will work collectively once more.”
“That is uncharted territory, and no one has any concept of what a sequel might appear to be,” the insider added.
How Did Blake Energetic & Justin Baldoni’s Feud Escalate?
In response to The Hollywood Reporter, the filmmakers’ working relationship was impacted throughout post-production. The publication reported that two completely different cuts of the movie had been created, inflicting an alleged divide in inventive variations.
As web sleuths have observed, Blake and It Ends With Us e-book creator Colleen Hoover don’t observe Justin on Instagram though he follows them. And the social media exercise isn’t the one space the place the solid’s relationship allegedly went downhill.
PEOPLE reported on August 13, 2024, that the rumored stress with Justin includes the “principal solid” and Colleen.
“All is just not what it appears,” an insider from the set instructed the publication. “There may be far more to this story. The principal solid and Elisabeth McGowan Colleen Hoover may have nothing to do with him.”
Blake Energetic Sues Justin Baldoni
On December 21, 2024, TMZ reported that Blake filed a lawsuit in opposition to Justin for alleged sexual harassment. The lawsuit said that an all-hands-on-deck assembly was held on the set of It Ends With Us to deal with the alleged poisonous work setting. In response to the outlet, the assembly addressed the next calls for: no extra exhibiting nude movies or photographs of different girls to Blake; no extra feedback about Justin’s alleged earlier “pornography dependancy; no additional conversations about sexual experiences in entrance of Blake and different folks; no extra mentions of solid and crew’s genitalia; and no extra inquiries about Blake’s weight.
One other demand that was talked about was “no extra including of intercourse scenes, oral intercourse or on-camera climaxing by BL outdoors the scope of the script BL accepted when signing onto the mission,” per TMZ.
TMZ additional reported that It Ends With Us flopped on the field workplace as a result of Blake and Justin disagreed on tips on how to market the movie. In response to the outlet, Blake allegedly wished the her character’s resilience to be the main focus, whereas Justin allegedly wished to make the main focus extra severe as a result of the film addresses home violence.
In response to her lawsuit, Justin’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, launched a press release to The Hollywood Reporter, calling Blake’s lawsuit “shameful” that she and her representatives “would make such severe and categorically false accusations in opposition to Mr. Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios and its representatives, as one more determined try and ‘repair’ her damaging status which was garnered from her personal remarks and actions throughout the marketing campaign for the movie; interviews and press actions that had been noticed publicly, in actual time and unedited, which allowed for the web to generate their very own views and opinions.”
Justin Baldoni Sues ‘The New York Instances’
On December 31, Selection reported that Justin filed a $250 million lawsuit in opposition to The New York Instances over its revealed story titled, “We Can Bury Anybody’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine.” On behalf of Justin and several other different plaintiffs, Bryan filed a grievance alleging that the publication dedicated promissory fraud and breach of implied-in-fact contract.
In response, a NYT spokesperson mentioned, “The position of an impartial information group is to observe the info the place they lead. Our story was meticulously and responsibly reported. It was primarily based on a evaluation of hundreds of pages of authentic paperwork, together with the textual content messages and emails that we quote precisely and at size within the article. Thus far, 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 properly. We plan to vigorously defend in opposition to the lawsuit.”
Justin Baldoni Sues Blake Energetic & Ryan Reynolds
On January 16, 2025, Baldoni filed a lawsuit in opposition to Energetic and Reynolds, accusing them of hijacking It Ends With Us and destroying his status with false allegations of sexual harassment. In response to Selection, the grievance learn, “This can be a case about two of essentially the most highly effective stars on the planet deploying their monumental energy to steal a whole movie proper out of the arms of its director and manufacturing studio … When Plaintiffs have their day in court docket, the jury will acknowledge that even essentially the most highly effective celeb can not bend the reality to her will.”