A year after It Ends With Us landed in cinemas, the feud between co-stars Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni shows no signs of abating. Despite the judge's ruling to throw out Baldoni's countersuit in June, which alleged defamation, extortion and and invasion of privacy, there still seems to be foul play keeping the saga in the headlines.
Last December, after months of speculation about what happened behind the scenes of the film, Lively filed a lawsuit against Baldoni alleging sexual harassment and claims a calculated smear campaign was launched against her by his PR team. It came in tandem with a New York Times article detailing her alleged experiences and prompted Baldoni to countersue Lively for $400m and the New York Times for $250m.
What followed was a toxic back and forth between the pair, all of which prompted unprecedented commentary on social media, with TikTok sleuths wading through legal documents to offer their 'takes' on the dispute.
However, once Judge Liman ruled that Baldoni's claims were unsubstantiated – both against Lively and the NYT – onlookers might have been fooled into thinking the story would fade from public view.
Baldoni's legal team had other ideas. On 31 July, Lively was summoned to depose in front of the defence team to testify about her sexual harassment claims. At one point prior to the deposition, Baldoni's attorney, Bryan Freedman, suggested hosting the meeting as a pay-per-view event at Madison Square Garden with proceeds going to domestic abuse organisations.
Even if this were a charitable endeavour, it is a preposterous suggestion, and the judge granted Lively's request to choose the location for the deposition herself. She opted for her lawyer's office in New York.
'Justin Baldoni's lawyer has tried to make this matter a public spectacle at every turn,' Lively's rep told People. 'Even proposing to sell tickets to a televised deposition at Madison Square Garden. This is a serious matter of sexual harassment and retaliation, and it deserves to be treated as such.'
Her legal team later added: 'Defendants have not denied that their intent is to manufacture a harassing stunt by requiring Ms Lively to parade through paparazzi, or by inviting unknown attendees to the deposition, including members of the media or social media influencers, or any other number of abusive tactics.'
The judge's decision to allow Lively to choose the location did not go down well with Baldoni's team who accused her of 'foot-stomping' and using her 'celebrity status' to control proceedings, adding 'her counsel's tantrum has no place in this court'.
What happened at Blake Lively's deposition?
This meant matters were particularly acrimonious between both sides before the deposition took place – something that appears to have continued afterwards.
According to details allegedly leaked to the Daily Mail, Lively attended with her older sister Robyn Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds and a team of eight lawyers, while Baldoni and Freedman were the only two to attend on the defence side.
However, Lively's lawyers later clarified that she 'testified across the table from Mr Baldoni, Jamey Heath, Steve Sarowitz, Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel, all of whom attended the deposition in person, as well as eight attorneys representing Wayfarer and Wallace Parties, two of whom questioned her'.
Have Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni met face to face since It Ends With Us came out?
Yes, Lively's deposition is thought to be the first time the pair have met in person since the saga began last summer. While Baldoni's decision to attend Lively's deposition is unusual, it is no unheard of, and he has the right to be present at oral depositions relating to the case to prepare for trial next March.
Did Justin Baldoni attempt to release Blake Lively's deposition transcript?
According to Lively, Baldoni attempted to upload the 292-page transcript after the deposition took place. This is unsurprising to those who have been following the case given that he has previously uploaded his lawsuits onto a publicly available website for anyone to read.
In a motion filed by Lively's team, they argue: 'There is no conceivable legal purpose to file the whole transcript, particularly given that it has not been reviewed, corrected or finalised, and a mere two pages of it were cited in their argument.'
Lively’s lawyers claim the move was 'a manufactured excuse to force the transcript into the public domain as fodder for the Wayfarer Defendants’ media campaign' and have asked the judge to strike the rough draft of her deposition from the court record, as the motion to seal it is pending.
'Ms. Lively affirmatively pursued this litigation with the full intention and desire to have her testimony heard in a legal process, governed by the rules of evidence which publicly filing this rough draft transcript in this manner substantially undermines,' the letter reads. 'To suggest otherwise is part of an ongoing character attack that Mr. Freedman has been advancing to undermine Ms. Lively’s credibility and taint the jury pool.'
Baldoni has denied all allegations made in Lively's original lawsuit and has not yet publicly responded to her team's claims that he attempted to publish the deposition transcript as 'fodder' in a wider media campaign.
Nikki Peach is a writer at Grazia UK, working across entertainment, TV and news. She has also written for the i, i-D and the New Statesman Media Group and covers all things pop culture for Grazia (treating high and lowbrow with equal respect).