Blake Lively’s accusations against Justin Baldoni highlight Hollywood’s ‘sinister’ tactics

Actress Blake Lively was arguably the Internet’s public enemy number one for a couple of weeks over the summer. Now she has filed an explosive legal case that she says reveals “sinister” tactics used to damage reputations in Hollywood, and that is making people wonder who and what to believe.

Blake Lively had always been a pretty harmless type of actress.

She had appeared in hit films and television shows, such as Gossip Girl and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. She married fellow superstar Ryan Reynolds. She is friends with Taylor Swift.

Then, in August, while promoting his latest film It Ends With Us, Suddenly it became controversial, on the verge of being canceled.

She was criticized for comments that appeared to downplay domestic violence, the film’s theme; while old uncomfortable interviews were resurfaced and repurposed as evidence of bullying behavior.

Public opinion – at least among those who knew and cared about her – seemed to have turned against her.

Then the movie came out, the furor died down, and social media moved on.

But Lively has now filed a legal case claiming that she suffered sexual harassment from her It Ends With Us co-star and director Justin Baldoni, and that when she complained, he and his studio Wayfarer retaliated by waging a campaign to “destroy “his reputation.

She was the target of “a sophisticated, coordinated and well-funded retaliation plan” designed “to silence her,” which included an “armed digital army” and false stories that were passed on to “unwitting reporters,” her lawyers alleged. – and that is why it became the focus of negative publicity.

His attorneys have released text messages sent between Baldoni’s publicist, Jennifer Abel, and Melissa Nathan, a crisis communications specialist hired by his firm to help handle the harassment complaint. They seem to give a rare glimpse into conversations that are normally kept out of the spotlight.

Nathan proposed a strategy to “start theory threads” on social media, to “create, seed and promote content that appeared authentic” and engage in “social manipulation,” according to the legal documents.

“You know we can bury anyone,” Nathan wrote to Abel in a damning argument.

Now, the people hired to do crisis PR for Baldoni are doing crisis PR themselves.

Abel has said that Lively’s lawyers “cherry-picked” messages for inclusion in her case without crucial context, and that “no ‘smear’ was implemented.”

“No negative press, no social combat plan was ever provided, although we were prepared for it because it is our job to be prepared for any scenario.

“But we didn’t have to implement anything because the Internet did the work for us.”

The backlash against Lively came naturally and didn’t need her help, Abel said.

Attorney Bryan Freedman, who represents Baldoni and his firm, as well as Abel and Nathan, echoed that.

He said Baldoni hired a crisis manager due to “multiple demands and threats” allegedly made by Lively, including “threatening not to (appear) on set, threatening not to promote the film, which ultimately led to her disappearance during the premiere, if their demands were not met.

He said the plan drawn up by Nathan’s firm “proved unnecessary as the public found Lively’s own actions, interviews and marketing during the promotional tour distasteful, and responded organically to that, which the media itself picked up on.”

Overall, Freedman called Lively’s complaint “shameful” and filled with “categorically false accusations.”

In recent days, Lively has received support from a number of former co-stars and others in Hollywood.

The name of one of his followers stands out.

Amber Heard, ex-wife of Johnny Depp, he told NBC: “Social media is the absolute embodiment of the classic saying: ‘A lie travels halfway around the world before the truth can put on its boots.’

“I saw this firsthand and up close. It’s as horrible as it is destructive.”

Heard was on the receiving end of social media hostility during two high-profile defamation trials involving Depp in the UK and US in 2020 and 2022. Nathan also reportedly worked for Depp.

Freedman responded to Heard by saying the only connection between her and Lively was that “for decades, every move they’ve made has been there for everyone to see” so the public could “make their own decisions, which they did organically.” “.

Tortoise Media’s head of investigations, Alexi Mostrous, who hosted a podcast called Who trolled Amber? Earlier this year, examining the abuse she received, she said there were parallels.

“In both the Blake Lively and Amber Heard cases, you see public relations firms working with digital media specialists and other ‘contractors’ to promote online stories beneficial to their wealthy clients in ways that are opaque and not well-known. understood,” he told the BBC. News.

“It’s an unregulated world where all kinds of tactics can take place behind closed doors.”

Variety said Lively’s case “exposes a showbiz process that is meant to operate in the shadows: the hiring of expensive crisis communications experts to influence opinion and energize clients.”

His accusations suggest a “sinister shadow campaign” that went “beyond what most Hollywood advertising companies consider acceptable.” The Wrap’s Sharon Waxman wrote.

According to Rory Lynch, partner and head of reputation management law at Gateley Legal, it is “a fairly common tactic” in Hollywood and business disputes “to have PRs on both sides plant negative, sometimes false, stories about the opposition.” .

“Even in the golden age of Hollywood, there were rumors that Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor were using public relations professionals to negatively inform each other.”

However, PR people who worked for Baldoni and his studio “dropped the ball a little bit” when discussing tactics in the texts, he told BBC News.

“It doesn’t surprise me, especially in America and Hollywood, that there are some pretty aggressive crisis PR people.

“But I think the fact that they put it in writing probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do. Normally they would do something like that over the phone.”

Lively herself is “a sophisticated operator” who “will also have her own public relations staff working in the background,” Lynch added.

The New York Timeswhich broke the story of Lively’s complaint over the weekend, said she “denied that she or any of her representatives planted or spread negative information about Mr. Baldoni or Wayfarer.”

The newspaper also notes that “it is impossible to know how much of the negative publicity” toward Lively was originally sown by those working on Baldoni’s behalf, “and how much they noticed and amplified.”

Many fans who turned against Lively now see the situation from a different perspective.

“We are so capable of being manipulated into hating a woman that all it takes is a coordinated public relations effort to get us to switch sides against a domestic abuse victim or a long-time American girlfriend.” wrote Maddy Mussen in the Standard.

“Now that our eyes are open, will we be harder to fool? Or will we still want any excuse to turn on a famous woman who is suddenly, in our eyes and in the eyes of those who manipulate us, no longer worthy?”

The Guardian’s Laura Snapes wrote that she and her friends now “remembered, horrified, what we had said about her in recent months.”

He added: “Lively’s complaint has my head spinning. What can you really trust?”