More bombshell claims are coming out from Blake Lively’s lawsuit against her It Ends With Us co-star and director Justin Baldoni.
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants star, 37, said that a lack of protections on set led to her and her infant son Olin catching COVID-19.
Not only that, but she also alleged that Baldoni, 40, failed to notify Lively that she’d been exposed to the virus.
Even worse, the production didn’t have insurance for COVID delays in filming and Baldoni was upset about the time and money lost when Blake had COVID and couldn’t work.
‘Ms. Lively was told by another producer that Wayfarer did not have insurance coverage for COVID,’ the legal paperwork states and that’s why Blake wasn’t informed of her exposure.
‘Mr. Baldoni deliberately withheld from Ms. Lively that she had been exposed to COVID. Both Ms. Lively and her infant child contracted COVID from the outbreak.’
Lively shares Olin as well as daughters James, 9, Inez, 8, and Betty, 5, with husband Ryan Reynolds.
She tried to raise concerns with Baldoni and his producing partner Jamey Heath but was shut down, according to the legal docs.
‘Ms. Lively expressed her upset that Mr. Heath and Mr. Baldoni had hidden the fact that she had been exposed to a COVID outbreak on set from which she and her infant contracted COVID,’ the statement began.
‘Instead of acknowledging responsibility and committing to safety moving forward, they expressed upset over production days missed and resulting costs.’
When production resumed after the WGA and SAG strikes, Blake had a list of conditions that must be met for her to return to filming and she included that list in the legal documents.
‘If BL is exposed to COVID-19, she must be provided notice as soon as possible after Wayfarer or any producer or production executive becomes aware of such exposure,’ one of the items on the request read.
In the lawsuit, which was filed on December 20, she accused Baldoni of sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment as well as launching a smear campaign with the intent to ‘destroy’ her reputation.
In the court documents, the leaked plan from Baldoni’s crisis management team reportedly revealed the intention to target Lively in a calculated smear campaign.
Lively’s lawsuit is full of explosive revelations and allegations including accusing The Jane the Virgin star of entering her trailer while she was nude, and letting his ‘friends’ watch her film sex scenes, along with other activities, creating a ‘hostile work environment.’
The Gossip Girl star had given birth to her fourth child a few months before filming began in May 2023, and she alleged that Baldoni treated her as a ‘sex object’ while being overly concerned with her weight.
On the second day of filming, for example, Mr. Baldoni made the rest of the cast and crew wait for hours while he cried in Ms. Lively’s dressing room, claiming social media commentators were saying that Ms. Lively looked old and unattractive based on paparazzi photos from the set,’ the filing alleges.
Lively claimed she tried to reassure the director ‘that she should look authentic in the scenes depicted in the photos, which were just after her character had been abused by her fictional husband, rather than “hot.”‘
The leading lady claimed Baldoni continually focused on her physical appearance and ‘routinely degraded’ her by finding ‘back channel ways of criticizing her body and weight.’
The filing also alleges that Baldoni secretly contacted Lively’s fitness trainer, implying he wanted her to ‘lose weight in two weeks,’ and claiming he was worried about having to pick her up for an upcoming scene, even though no such scene was in the script.
Lively claimed when she came down with strep throat, he offered to connect her with ‘an expert he had on retainer to help her with probiotics and to combat the sickness,’ as a gift.
However, when she was filling out the privacy forms, Lively learned the ‘expert’ was a ‘weight loss specialist.’
In another incident, Lively, who was nursing her son at the time, wore a low-cut dress to facilitate breast feeding.
She asserted that Baldoni ‘commented about how much he liked her outfit’ and later asked her to remove her coat in front of ‘the crew and multiple background actors in a packed bar.’
Lively claimed Baldoni asked her to remove the coat because he wanted to ‘see her “onesie” under the coat because it was zipped low to reveal her lace bra.’
She added that he allegedly told her, ‘I think you look sexy,’ which Lively said made her feel ‘ogled and exposed.
