Filmmaker Justin Baldoni publicly addressed his legal battle with former “It Ends With Us” co-star Blake Lively for the first time Wednesday night, saying he and his wife chose to remain silent throughout the litigation until the case was resolved.
“We have not spoken publicly for the better part of the last two years, and it’s not because we haven’t had anything to say, because Lord knows we have,” Baldoni said in a video he posted alongside his wife, Emily. “But it just felt like every time we went to make a video like this, we wanted to speak, something was telling us not to. It just didn’t feel like the right time, and we were talking about it and feeling into it and praying about it.”
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Emily agreed, saying there was “so much to say” about the drama with Lively.
“We’ve had to wrestle with so many things and try to understand so many things,” Emily Baldoni said. “Like, how could something like this even happen? Let alone disguised as a fight for women.”
Baldoni said he intentionally didn’t add to the conversation until the case was settled. The filmmaker also thanked all his supporters for listening to his side.
“You have given your time to fight for us, and thank you does not feel like enough,” he said. “But we’re here, in large part, because of so many of you and all of our friends and family. One thing that we’ve learned is that when God presses the reset button and everything else is stripped away, that’s when love shows up, and we feel so loved.”
The legal drama between the former co-stars started in December 2024 when Lively filed a lawsuit against Baldoni accusing him of sexual harassment, retaliation, and attempting to “destroy” her reputation. This came after she starred opposite Baldoni in “It Ends With Us,” a film he also directed.
Baldoni fervently denied the claims and filed a countersuit against his co-star and her husband, actor Ryan Reynolds. The judge dismissed the countersuit in June 2025. The parties reached a settlement in May 2026.
Baldoni also sued The New York Times for $250 million in a defamation claim for an article about the situation, which he says is “rife with inaccuracies, misrepresentations, and omissions.”
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