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Toronto Sun
6 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Toronto Sun
Justin Baldoni gets access to Taylor Swift and Blake Lively's texts
'Baldoni's desire to drag Taylor Swift into this has been constant dating back to August 2024' Get the latest from Mark Daniell straight to your inbox Taylor Swift and Blake Lively seen prior to Super Bowl LVIII between the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs at Allegiant Stadium on Feb. 11, 2024 in Las Vegas. Photo by Steph Chambers / Getty Images Justin Baldoni has scored a legal victory in his ongoing court battle with Blake Lively when a judge ruled the actor can obtain messages between his It Ends With Us co-star and her pop star pal Taylor Swift. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Don't have an account? Create Account Lively had been seeking to prevent Baldoni from accessing her personal communications with Swift, but U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman ruled that his legal team can access communications between the two as it pertains to their work on It Ends With Us . Last December, Lively, 37, accused Baldoni, 41, of sexual harassment on the set of their 2024 romantic drama and claimed he tried to damage her reputation as part of a smear campaign after a meeting in which she and her husband Ryan Reynolds addressed 'repeated sexual harassment and other disturbing behaviour' by the Jane the Virgin star and producers on the film. The New York Times also published an article with the headline 'We Can Bury Anyone: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine ,' which was an account of how Baldoni's PR team allegedly tried to ruin Lively's reputation. Your noon-hour look at what's happening in Toronto and beyond. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. Please try again This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Baldoni denied the allegations and countersued Lively accusing her, Reynolds and the Times of defamation and extortion. This combination of images shows Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, and Ryan Reynolds. Photo by AP / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS But his suit hit a snag last week when Liman pronounced Baldoni couldn't sue for defamation because allegations in a legal claim are exempt from libel lawsuits. Liman also nixed Baldoni's claim that Lively stole creative control of the film. The Times were let off the hook because Baldoni had not shown that the paper 'acted with actual malice.' The judge, however, said Baldoni could revise the lawsuit if he wanted to pursue different claims, which he intends to do. But as part of his defence against Lively's lawsuit, Baldoni will be able to obtain access to communications between the actress and Swift. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'Given that Lively has represented that Swift had knowledge of complaints or discussions about the working environment on the film, among other issues, the requests for messages with Swift regarding the film and this action are reasonably tailored to discover information that would prove or disprove Lively's harassment and retaliation claims,' Liman wrote . A representative for Lively denounced the decision in a statement to NBC News. 'Baldoni's desire to drag Taylor Swift into this has been constant dating back to August 2024 … a strategy to influence the 'TS fanbase,'' the spokesperson said. 'We will continue to call out Baldoni's relentless efforts to exploit Ms. Swift's popularity, which from day one has been nothing more than a distraction from the serious sexual harassment and retaliation accusations he and the Wayfarer parties are facing,' the spokesperson added, referring to the film's production company. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. The Cruel Summer hitmaker had been subpoenaed by Baldoni's lawyers as a possible witness in the case, but the legal tactic was dropped last month. Baldoni alleged that Lively referred to Swift as one of her 'dragons' and he has accused the singer of trying to force him to accept Lively's changes to the film's script, which was based on the bestselling novel by Colleen Hoover. After Swift was subpoenaed, a firm representing the Grammy winner said she was irrelevant to the case and insisted her only involvement with It Ends With Us was to allow the use of her song My Tears Ricochet in the trailer and one scene from the movie. 'Taylor Swift never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film, she did not even see It Ends With Us until weeks after its public release, and was travelling around the globe during 2023 and 2024 headlining the biggest tour in history,' a representative for Swift told Fox News . This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. But Liman said that Lively's claim that Baldoni is trying to use Swift to help craft a 'public relations narrative outside of court' doesn't mean he shouldn't have access to the messages as it pertains to their movie. This image released by Sony Pictures shows Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively in a scene from 'It Ends With Us.' Photo by Nicole Rivelli / Sony Pictures 'The mere fact that the request has been discussed in the press does not render it illegitimate,' the judge wrote. As the he said/she said legal drama continues to unfold ahead of a 2026 trial date, sources tell the Daily Mail that Swift has pulled away from Lively. 'Right now, if Taylor had one wish it would be that she never met Blake,' an insider claimed to the outlet . 'Although there have been good times during their relationship, the issues now concerning the Baldoni case have outweighed them.' Swift's boyfriend, Travis Kelce, also recently unfollowed Reynolds on Instagram. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. 'Taylor and Travis are disgusted with Blake and Ryan and how they tried to use Taylor in their fight against Justin Baldoni,' the source added. 'They're vowing their break from the acting couple is permanent.' Lively's reference to Swift as one of her 'dragons' also didn't sit well with the musician. 'She will forever be furious at how Blake quite clearly was using her for clout and leverage in her dealings with Justin. She really hates that Blake would even think like that, let alone write the things she did in that text,' a source told Page Six . The insider added that they were never even really close. 'They were baking pals, travel pals, home decor pals… and to be totally honest, billionaire pals. They got along because they each lived their lives with the sort of trappings and access and privilege that tons of money brings.' mdaniell@ Read More Columnists Toronto & GTA MMA World NHL
Los Angeles Times
13 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
‘Ginny & Georgia' is a breakthrough in showing abortion as a personal experience
The series: 'Ginny & Georgia.' The setting: A women's healthcare clinic. The scene: Ginny, 16, is carrying an unwanted pregnancy. She's seeking an abortion. During a preconsultation, a clinic provider asks if she needs more time to decide. No, says the teen, she's sure. There's no proverbial wringing of hands around the character's decision. No apologizing for her choice. Why? Because it's not for us to judge. It's a personal matter, despite all the politicization around reproductive rights that might have us believe otherwise. Opinions, debates and legislative fights around abortion have raged since Roe vs. Wade was adjudicated by the Supreme Court in 1973, then overturned in 2022. It's no secret why such a lightning-rod issue is rarely touched by series television. Alienating half the country is bad for ratings. Exceptions include breakthrough moments on shows such as 'Maude,' 'The Facts of Life' and 'Jane the Virgin,' but even those episodes were careful to weigh the sensitivity of the political climate over a transparent depiction of their character's motivations and experience. Another pitfall is that subplots featuring abortion storylines are hard to pull off without feeling like a break from scheduled programming for an antiabortion or pro-abortion-rights PSA, or worse, a pointless exercise in bothsidesism. Season 3 of Netflix dramedy 'Ginny & Georgia' dares to go there, unapologetically making the political personal inside a fun, wily and addictive family saga. The series, the streamer's No. 1 show since it returned two weeks ago, skillfully delivers an intimate narrative that defies judgment and the fear of being judged. The hourlong series, which launched in 2021, follows single mom Georgia Miller (Brianne Howey), her angsty teenage daughter Ginny (Antonia Gentry) and her young son Austin (Diesel La Torraca). This formerly nomadic trio struggles to forge a 'normal' life in the fictional Boston suburb of Wellsbury. Flamboyant, fast-talking Southerner Georgia stands out among the fussy, provincial New England set. Born in Alabama to drug-addicted parents, she fled her abusive upbringing as a teenager. Homeless, she met Zion (played as an adult by Nathan Mitchell), a college-bound student from a good family. Soon into their relationship, she fell pregnant, giving birth to their daughter Ginny, kicking off a life on the run and in service of protecting her children. Now in her 30s, the blond bombshell has relied on her beauty, innate smarts and countless grifts to endure poverty and keep her family intact. The hardscrabble lifestyle has made Ginny wise beyond her years, though she's not immune to mercurial teen mood swings and the sophomoric drama of high school. But history appears to repeat itself when Ginny becomes pregnant after having sex just once with a fellow student from her extracurricular poetry class. Overwhelmed, he's the first person she tells about their dilemma. 'That's wild,' he responds idiotically, before abruptly taking off, leaving her to deal with the pregnancy on her own. Episode 7 largely revolves around Ginny's decision to have an abortion, a thoughtfully paced subplot that breaks from the perpetual chaos and deadly secrets permeating the Millers' universe. Ginny is painfully aware that she is the product of an unwanted pregnancy and her mother's choice not to have an abortion. Georgia has repeatedly said her kids are the best thing that ever happened to her. But when counseling her distraught daughter, Georgia says the choice is Ginny's to make, and no one else's. Here's where 'Ginny & Georgia' might have launched into a didactic, pro-abortion-rights lecture cloaked in a TV drama, or played it safe by pulling back and highlighting both women's stories in equal measure. Instead it chose to bring viewers in close, following Ginny's singular experience from her initial shame and panic, to moving conversations with her mom, to that frank counseling session at the women's health center where she made it quite clear she was not ready to be a mother. We watched her take the medication, then experience what followed: painful cramping, pangs of guilt, waves of relief and the realization she now bore a new, lifelong emotional scar that wasn't caused by her mother. By sticking to Ginny's intimate story, through her perspective, the series delivers a story that is hers and hers alone, partisan opinions be damned. 'Ginny & Georgia' has offered up many surprises over its three seasons. Georgia has emerged one of the more entertaining, cunning and inventive antiheroes of the 2020s. As such, she attracts men in droves, schemes a la Walter White and doesn't believe in therapy: 'We don't do that in the South. We shoot things and eat butter.' But therapy might be a good idea given Season 3's cliffhanger ending: another accidental pregnancy.
Los Angeles Times
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
Judge shakes off Blake Lively's motion to keep texts with Taylor Swift confidential
Some of Blake Lively's text messages with friend Taylor Swift could play in court, in a recent development of the actor's winding legal battle against her 'It Ends With Us' co-star Justin Baldoni. U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman on Wednesday filed an order denying the 'Gossip Girl' alumna's request to keep her messages with Swift out of litigation, according to legal documents reviewed by The Times. 'Given that Lively has represented that Swift had knowledge of complaints or discussions about the working environment on the film, among other issues, the requests for messages with Swift regarding the film and this action are reasonably tailored to discover information that would prove or disprove Lively's harassment and retaliation claims,' reads the order. Baldoni and his Wayfarer Studios filed a request for production connected to the Lively-Swift texts in February, asking for ''all documents and communications related to or reflecting Lively's communications with Taylor Swift' about their their 2024 romantic drama and subsequent legal proceedings. The 'It Ends With Us' co-stars have engaged in a legal back-and-forth for months after Lively accused director Baldoni of sexual harassment on the set of the film and accused his team of orchestrating a smear campaign against her in December. The allegations first surfaced in a report from the New York Times. She formally sued 'Jane the Virgin' alumnus Baldoni in federal court on Dec. 31. Baldoni and nine other plaintiffs — including his crisis PR team and executives at Wayfarer Studios — hit back that same day with a $400 million countersuit against Lively and her husband, 'Deadpool' star Ryan Reynolds, and a separate defamation complaint against the New York Times. Liman dismissed Baldoni's complaints, which failed to meet legal standards, earlier this month. The judge said in his Wednesday order that 'Lively's motion is rooted in the broader concern that the Wayfarer Parties are using demands for communications with Swift not 'to obtain information relevant to claims and defenses in court, but to prop up a public relations narrative outside of court.'' Wednesday's order also denied Baldoni's cross-motion to compel Lively to produce documents connected to the production. Baldoni's team subpoenaed Swift earlier this year, but eventually withdrew it after the singer and her legal reps dismissed it as an 'unwarranted fishing expedition,' according to Variety. In a statement shared with multiple outlets, a representative for Lively reacted to this week's order, claiming 'Baldoni's desire to drag Taylor Swift into this has been constant dating back to August 2024' and is an effort to influence the singer's fan base. In the past, the devoted league of Swift supporters known as Swifites have banded together to criticize the singer's high-profile exes and in recent years, rallied against Ticketmaster over allegations of fraud, price-fixing and antitrust violations. 'We will continue to call out Baldoni's relentless efforts to exploit Ms. Swift's popularity, which from day one has been nothing more than a distraction from the serious sexual harassment and retaliation accusations he and the Wayfarer parties are facing,' the spokesperson added, according to People. Representatives for Swift and Baldoni did not immediately respond to The Times' request for comment.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Justin Baldoni gains access to Taylor Swift and Blake Lively's private texts in legal victory
Taylor Swift got dragged back into Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively's 'It Ends With Us' feud after her subpoena to appear in court was dismissed. US District Judge Lewis Liman ruled on Wednesday that the 'Jane the Virgin' star can request communications between the singer and Lively concerning the 2024 domestic violence film, according to documents obtained by Page Six. 'The requests for messages with Swift regarding the film and this action are reasonably tailored to discover information that would prove or disprove Lively's harassment and retaliation claims,' Liman claimed. The messages, however, must be about the film based on Colleen Hoover's 2016 novel of the same name, or Lively, 37, and Baldoni's ongoing legal challenge. The 'Gossip Girl' star's lawyers attempted to bargain with Baldoni's team, saying they would hand over any documents the latter's attorneys desire, but not Swift's text messages, in return for 'all video footage related to the film and full, unredacted versions of communication' listed in Baldoni's complaint. Baldoni's attorney denied the agreement. Reps for Swift and Lively weren't immediately available to Page Six for comment. The judge's ruling comes after Lively asked the court to protect her messages with Swift, 35, on Friday. According to court documents obtained by Page Six, the 'Age of Adaline' star argued that the messages are 'not central' to the case, including her December lawsuit accusing Baldoni, 41, of sexual harassment and coordinating a smear campaign to ruin her career. Swift was dragged into the director and Lively's legal drama in January, when she was mentioned in Baldoni's $400 million counter lawsuit, which has since been dismissed. Per the filing, the 'Five Feet Apart' director accused the actress of using the 'Lover' songstress and her husband Ryan Reynolds' status to get her way on the 'It Ends With Us' set. Baldoni alleged he was invited to the A-list couple's home, where 'a famous, and famously close, friend' was also present to discuss 'script re-writes.' Baldoni's attorney, Bryan Freedman, cited alleged text messages between his client and Lively, which stated that Swift and Reynolds, 48, were her 'dragons' and protectors. 'The message could not have been clearer. Baldoni was not just dealing with Lively. He was also facing Lively's 'dragons,' two of the most influential and wealthy celebrities in the world, who were not afraid to make things very difficult for him,' Freedman claimed. In May, Swift was subpoenaed as a witness in the March 2026 trial, though the request was later dropped. The legal drama has caused a rift between the pop icon and Lively, with an insider telling Page Six that Swift will 'forever be furious' at the actress for bringing her into the mess.
Time of India
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Judge shuts down Blake Lively's request for Wayfarer docs in legal feud with Justin Baldoni
In a plot twist messier than a reality show finale, Blake Lively's request to peek into Wayfarer Studios' internal investigation files just got a firm nope from the judge. According to court docs filed on Monday, June 12, Judge Lewis J. Liman ruled that the studio's paperwork is protected under attorney-client privilege and cannot be handed over to Lively. Major ouch. Blake Lively denied access to Wayfarer docs Wayfarer, co-founded by Jane the Virgin star Justin Baldoni, is at the centre of this legal storm, and they, along with Baldoni, fought tooth and nail to keep those documents under lock and key. So, what is Blake actually suing for? Lively has accused Baldoni of sexual harassment, creating a toxic work vibe on the It Ends With Us set, and allegedly masterminding a smear campaign against her. But that is not all. She also claims Wayfarer failed to properly investigate her complaints back in May 2023, and she is suing them for that too. A whole side plot of its own. Her legal team argued that Wayfarer only bothered launching an investigation after slapping Lively with a $400 million lawsuit, calling the move 'belated' and legally pointless now. They added that since Wayfarer delayed the investigation, they cannot use that move as a defence anymore. Translation? You snooze, you lose. Blake vs. Justin: The legal saga This celeb feud went full soap opera in December 2024 when Baldoni clapped back with a lawsuit of his own — aiming it not just at Lively but also at her husband Ryan Reynolds and publicist Leslie Sloane. The claims? Defamation, civil extortion, and other spicy accusations with a $400 million price tag. Earlier this month, the judge swiped left on Baldoni's lawsuit and dismissed it — but allowed him to edit and refile parts of it before the June 23 deadline. It Ends With Us drama is not over yet Blake flexed her legal win on Instagram, saying she stood strong for women's right to speak up. Meanwhile, Baldoni's lawyer hit back, calling Lively's victory lap 'predictable' and 'false.' He said the new version of their case will bring more tea and 'refined allegations.' So yeah, stay tuned, this Hollywood legal drama is far from over.
