Justin Baldoni sues New York Times over reporting of Blake Lively allegations
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The ‘It Ends With Us’ writer and director is one of 10 plaintiffs suing the newspaper for $250 million. It Ends With Us star and director Justin Baldoni is suing the New York Times over its reporting of Blake Lively’s sex harassment allegations against him.
Lively filed a lawsuit December 20 against Baldoni alleging that her co-star caused her “severe emotional distress” on the set of It Ends With Us and that he orchestrated a “smear campaign” against her after she asked for complaints to be addressed.
Those allegations were covered prominently by the Times in a December 21 article headlined: “‘We Can Bury Anyone’: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine.”. On Tuesday afternoon Baldoni and nine other plaintiffs including publicists Melissa Nathan and Jennifer Abel brought a $250 million lawsuit against the newspaper alleging libel and false-light invasion of privacy.
The suit, which has been seen by The Independent, was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court and claims that the Times reporting “‘cherry-picked’ and altered communications stripped of necessary context and deliberately spliced to mislead.”. It goes on to argue that “the Times relied almost entirely on Lively’s unverified and self-serving narrative.”.
The Independent has reached out to the New York Times and Baldoni and Nathan’s legal representatives for comment. Baldoni is also reportedly planning to counter-sue Lively. “I am not going to speak to when or how many lawsuits we are filing, but when we file our first lawsuit, it is going to shock everyone who has been manipulated into believing a demonstrably false narrative,” the lawyer said. “I will be supported by real evidence and tell the true story.”.
