Justin Baldoni released a voice memo he sent to Blake Lively at 2 am

Justin Baldoni continues to reveal the documentation he kept from his communications with Blake Lively, before, during and after they filmed It Ends With Us. This is all part of Baldoni’s lawsuit against Blake, Ryan Reynolds and their publicist Leslie Sloane, which came several weeks after he sued the New York Times, which came after Blake filed the complaint and sued Baldoni and his team. This is a web of lawsuits and yet it’s been playing out in the court of public opinion for more than a month. Blake and Ryan want Baldoni and his lawyer under a gag order, one of the biggest “let’s put the genie back in the bottle” attempts in recent memory. In recent days, I’ve seen some interesting attack pieces on Baldoni. If Blake and Ryan are behind some of those pieces, they’re doing a better job hiding their fingerprints.

As for Baldoni’s latest release, it’s a voice memo he sent to Blake at 2 am. The backstory (as you can hear somewhat in the recording) is that Baldoni had just met with Blake at her Tribeca penthouse hours earlier. This was the infamous meeting where Ryan Reynolds and Taylor Swift were also present, and Blake gave Justin some pages – scenes which she claimed to have rewritten, although it’s likely Ryan did the rewrites, scabbing in the middle of the writers’ strike. After Baldoni wasn’t wild about “Blake’s rewrites” in the meeting and clearly didn’t appreciate Blake using her A-list husband and BFF to pressure him, Blake sent him that text about how she’s the Khaleesi and Taylor and Ryan are her dragons, basically an implied threat that they needed to use the rewrites. So, this was the message Baldoni sent to Blake after the Khaleesi text:

Here’s TMZ’s coverage:

Justin Baldoni is following through on his vow to release all his communications with Blake Lively … revealing a nearly 7-minute apology he sent her at 2 AM while they were working on the “It Ends With Us” script.

Justin’s voice note was clearly recorded shortly after the costars’ now infamous meeting to discuss the movie’s rooftop scene — which Blake had rewritten — and he’s apologizing for his less than warm reaction to the changes … saying, “I’m really sorry. I f***ed up. I will admit and apologize when I fail. I’m a very flawed man, as my wife will attest.”

He continued, “I’m gonna piss you off, probably, but I will always apologize and find my way back to center. I’m sorry I made you feel that way. I will, for sure, do better.”

This was the meeting where Blake had her husband Ryan Reynolds and BFF Taylor Swift cheerleading for her script changes, and Justin acknowledges their input, telling Blake … “Damn right, you’ve got great friends. We should all have friends like that, aside from the fact that they’re 2 of the most creative people on the planet.”

Remember, in a text message to Justin, Blake referred to herself as Khaleesi from “Game of Thrones,” and called Taylor and Ryan her protective dragons. In his voice message, Justin says the 3 of them together are an incredibly powerful force, and he gushes about wanting to spend time with her crafting the movie. As we previously reported, Justin has said in legal docs, after that meeting, he felt like he needed to get on board with Blake’s changes or else.

Now, there are portions of the message folks who are Team Blake might find creepy — for instance, toward the end, Justin’s telling Blake how sorry he is that she’s had previous bad experiences with other filmmakers. He calls them “f***heads” and, ironically, tells her, “That’s not at all gonna be, or will be, and hopefully it’s not been the experience with me. There’s nothing more exciting to me that I get to work with Blake Lively and have all of her. I mean, that’s what I want!”

Justin goes on to say he and Blake are the “secret sauce” to making a great movie, and then finally, around 6 minutes and 30 seconds into the message, he cuts himself off and says, “I’m sorry. You probably have kids all over you, and a baby on your boob and you’re listening to me ramble.”

[From TMZ]

I know people are going to interpret the voice memo however they want, and obviously, people have really strong feelings about this situation. In my opinion, this memo sounds too personal and a bit creepy if you’re considering it in a siloed situation, without the backstory of the Khaleesi text and the fact that Taylor Swift was apparently trying to convince the director of a film to use “Blake’s rewrites.” I also think it’s clear that Baldoni was trying to just keep the show on the road, you know? He was trying to “manage” his leading actress and tell her what (he thought) she needed to hear.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

45 Responses to “Justin Baldoni released a voice memo he sent to Blake Lively at 2 am”

Comments are Closed

We close comments on older posts to fight comment spam.

  1. Danbury says:

    If a guy I was working with was harassing me and making me feel unsafe in the workplace and I had someone like Taylor Swift in my corner, I would 100% use that if it could help me. Again, Blake isn’t a perfect victim, but that doesn’t matter. Still a victim. Believe women. Even if you don’t like them. We ALL deserve to be believed.

    • Sasha says:

      We don’t know about swift. We don’t know her involvement if any. But I absolutely agree with you 100%. There’s so many bots and trolls all over the internet. That tells me the whole story. He deployed this before she publicly said anything. I don’t like her but I believe her. There was nothing in this fight for her. There’s enough of evidence. There’s loads in this fight for him.

    • megs283 says:

      Agreed. After learning about Baldoni’s toxic PR team, I view anything negative about Blake as part of that smear campaign.

    • AlpineWitch says:

      Yeah apparently unlikable women don’t deserve to be believed. As I said previously, I will reserve my judgement after the judges have deliberated on all those lawsuits. I don’t care about either of them but he seems like he’s still trying (successfully, I must say) to win in the court of public opinion. Hmmm… sounds like J. Depp’s strategy.

      • Artless says:

        Blake isn’t being believed because she’s “unlikeable”, or not the “perfect victim”, but because she’s not credible.

        We’re at a point where several of her allegations in her initial complaint are being disproved with further context & evidence from Baldoni’s lawsuits & leaks.

        From the leaked “it smells so good” video, to supposed pornography because a producer showed you a still image of his wife’s water birth for a birthing scene, Blake is coming across as a power hungry piece of work doing real damage to the ‘Me Too’ movement & countless victims of actual sexual harassment.

    • ML says:

      Thank you, Danbury.

    • jbones says:

      I will not just believe any human because they happen to be female- this is illogical. This isn’t about being the “perfect victim”. Her narrative appears to be a twisted truth to fit that of a SH victim, likely a retaliation for the smear campaign. Frankly, what Blake is doing isn’t helpful or healthy for actual victims of SH, myself included.

      * If anyone reading this was SH and not believed, I’m so sorry for what happened to you. That would be crushingly awful.

      I just don’t think that’s what’s happening here with BL.

    • Robert Phillips says:

      Your right We All deserve to be heard. Including men. And just watch any old Jerry Springer show to see that some women do lie to control men. Just the same as some men harass women. But it seems it doesn’t matter what information comes out. You will always believe the woman. Even though there is proof they lied.

  2. Kate says:

    Also he was replying to her own 1am+ text. He wasn’t randomly voice texting at 2am. He went to the meeting, got Blake’s dragon text, then sent the apology voice text.

    • Gilly says:

      That’s an important detail.
      Justin’s alleged bad behavior aside, why was the lead actress, her husband, her pop singer friend rewriting a movie? I don’t work in Hollywood so my industry doesn’t welcome my spouse’s input or my BFFs. And I would NEVER bring them in for that as it would diminish my authority in my male dominated industry.
      However if this was about Blake’s safety I can understand that. I guess I don’t know where this meeting took place in their timeline. If she didn’t feel safe with him anymore I’d have my security detail present moreso than a female singer.
      But I haven’t paid attention to this story much recently, I might be missing a lot of relevant details in the timeline.

  3. ThatGirlThere says:

    Messy. As. Hell. What in the world kind of working relationship did these two have? Why was Taylor included? Why was Ryan included for that matter? I look forward to this thing being settle and not hearing from them again tbh.

  4. K says:

    This is all very weird. This seems to me to make him sound…guilty. Stop calling people at 2am and whining. I believe that he did harass her and I also believe they were battling for control in manyyyy ways. What a fd up situation.

  5. Rachel says:

    Appeasing a bully only serves to embolden them… a reality we’re living in this godforsaken country these days with the Orange Menace. I’m not a Baldoni fan, but that was painful to listen to and only got him more grief. What a mess.

  6. Menlisa says:

    I understand why he did this, but never give in to or try to appease bullies, it only spurs them on.

  7. Giddy says:

    I’d be disgusted if a man I had worked with left me a message saying that I probably had “a baby on my boob”. That’s just downright creepy.

    • T says:

      She said in an interview that she had a boob cake made for her baby’s first birthday cake. That tells you about how creepy that would be to her.

      • Arizona says:

        making a funny cake for her kid’s birthday party is not the same as a coworker that you believe is sexually harassing you talking about you having your baby on your boob.

        it’s insane how people seem unable to parse the difference between these things, and I can only imagine that it’s intentional.

    • Jab says:

      Once again for the ppl in the back CONTEXT MATTERS. She was post partum and breastfeeding and included texts back and forth about it with him ( READ HIS LAWSUIT). Which is why he references that-…this guy is showing his receipts and context for all her claims and Blake defenders will always twist around.

    • Piper says:

      Exactly – so unprofessional and creepy – you would get reported to HR so fast in my company with a comment like this. Both sides should go to trial or mediation and just hash it out.

    • KNB says:

      Yes, this jumped out at me as well. I see that professional boundaries were extremely blurred between these two, but imagine if your boss or colleague said, “You probably have a baby on your boob.”

    • Kitten says:

      Yeah ew. WAY too familiar.

      My fave move from Team Baldoni is The Daily Fail coming out with the headline “Ryan Reynolds horrifically mean treatment of Deadpool co-star TJ Miller”.

      Oh you mean the TJ Miller that was arrested and jailed for assaulting an Uber driver? The TJ Miller who has credible SA allegations against him from 2001?The TJ Miller who was arrested for making a bomb threat at the LaGuardia AmTrak station?

      Yeah f*ck that guy. Baldoni has all the worst people coming to his defense and that, combined with what’s cited in Blake’s lawsuit, is enough for me to believe her.

      • ML says:

        Travis Flores (RIP) [idea for 5 Feet Apart] and Shane Norman [ racial discrimination] also have had lawsuits against Wayfarer. Justin Baldoni has form in this.

  8. LeonsMomma says:

    The pro-Baldoni forces have taken over TikTok. Hell, even Candace Owens is involved in analysis of this all. (Ryan Reynolds is the villain.)

    All I got to say is no one looks good in this, and we are very close to the point of no return with the lawsuits. I suggest that the three main parties take a look a “Bleak House” by Charles Dickens (Cliff Notes version for Blake.)

  9. T says:

    Will we get into the discussion of how she released her complaint to the NYT as a smear campaign and now wants a gag order? I predict a settlement from the NYT which will lead to a even more evidence on what Blake & Ryan did.

    • Arizona says:

      she filed a complaint and the NYT did investigative research into it. that is not the same as leaking voice notes and texts to TMZ, and it’s incredibly disingenuous to say that it is.

      not to mention, TMZ: the favored mouthpiece of men committing DARVO, such as Brad Pitt and Johnny Depp

      • Zapp Brannigan says:

        She filed the complaint on the 20th, NYT publised the 21st, but the images and story header used were created and dated as the 16th December, so they got a heads-up from someone before BL filed. All being discussed on social media at the moment, so who knows. It’s all messy as heck.

      • TheOtherOne says:

        The complaint is an administrative complaint, i.e., NOT publicly available. Someone had to give it to the NYTimes. Emily D Baker noted that Blake’s team is now trying to suggest that Baldoni leaked the complaint to the NYTimes (see their letters requesting a gag order). How would Baldoni have a copy of the complaint and the evidence used in the article? I believe she leaked the complaint to the NYTimes as well. This case is making it worse for her. I learned about her doing blackface/stalking a crush, referring to Leighton Mester as being born in a cage because Leighton was born in prison, and the other effed-up stuff she has said over the years. I didn’t think of her before, but now I’m like, yuck.

      • sevenblue says:

        @Zapp Brannigan, certainly someone from Blake’s legal team informed NYT and provided the court documents. However, the journalists who reported it are reliable. So, I am sure they did their research while covering the lawsuit. Comparing them to TMZ who got paid by the abusers all the time is disingenuous. Also, Blake filed that lawsuit after Justin’s PR team already started their campaign to bury her. It is only fair she shared her side of the story with a reliable newspaper and journalists.

  10. Piper says:

    I don’t think this voice mail helps his case. He comes across creepy and unprofessional. And her Khaleesi comment originally came off as boasting to me. But now I think she was using it to warn him off her – she has powerful people to protect her although where is HR in this mess?

    • AD says:

      It helps his case because it gives a lot of context. These leaks are not helping Ms. Blake and her claims that is all I have to say. Will continue to follow the evidence.

      Once a narrative takes hold in SM well… Baldoni has nothing to lose at this point while Blake has everything to lose. The narrative has run away from her. She tried bully him into accepting her supposed rewrites. Not sure if it’s personal. I think she had an agenda to take hold of this script and subsequent ones and Baldoni was just collateral damage. So she and her cohorts tried to steamroll him. I don’t think she expected him to fight back this hard. No, she wants to muzzle him because SM has picked sides.

      She better settle this or her reputation is going to be in tatters by the end of it all. Now, someone who worked with her on GG is on record spilling the tea. If she wants to be a director in Hollywood she better put this genie back in the bottle quick.

  11. sevenblue says:

    Depp lost his UK lawsuit when a judge made the decision. He won his lawsuit against Amber when the decision was made by a jury, not prohibited from looking at social media. That is what Justin is trying to do with all these leaks.

    • Kitten says:

      His billionaire bestie has all the time and money in the world to make it happen. The bot farms are already swarming like they did for Depp and people are playing right into it.

    • ambel says:

      you hit the nail on the head, sevenblue

  12. ML says:

    Why is Justin Baldoni dumping stuff in the news instead of saving it for court? He’s using Fox, NY Post and the Daily Fail among others, and right wingers are backing him.

    • Jais says:

      That’s where I’m at. Save this shit for court and stop flooding the public with this. And that applies to all parties.

  13. Who Were These People? says:

    “There’s nothing more exciting to me than working with Blake Lively and having all of her. I mean, that’s what I want.”

    Control. Possession. “Desire.”

    Look, she’s accused him and the producers of harassment and lack of workplace safety boundaries.

    He’s accusing her of being … somewhat unprofessional.

    Everything he presents shows boundary problems. Every insinuation against her is consistent with the smear campaign alleged in her lawsuit.

    There are clearly other background issues having to do with the approach to the source material and none of them seem to have had a handle on it. But that’s more about lack of artistry and it happens all the time. These were mediocre people working with mediocre source material about a sensitive topic.

    • Lizzie Bathory says:

      ^^^All of this. It’s all the same “destroy her” campaign Blake is alleging. And I don’t want a 6+ minute voice memo from any colleague *ever.* Much less one that mentions my boob.

      Here’s what I can’t get over: Blake could have been the biggest “difficult” actress the world has ever seen but if even part of what she alleges about Baldoni’s behavior is true, he sexually harassed her at work. And I have a hard time reconciling the nice feminist dude who just wants to bring awareness to domestic violence image with the guy who’s using Depp’s PR people & right wing media outlets to attack his accuser.

      • Kitten says:

        To your last sentence: the grossest part of this whole thing may be the complete disparity between his carefully cultivated public image and what is alleged in her lawsuit. I think there are men, who when asked, will proudly proclaim they are feminists. Then there are men like Baldoni who center themselves in a movement that doesn’t belong to them. They get their dopamine hits off of the approval and adulation–the “cookies”–they receive from women when they loudly and profusely assert their feminist cred.

        As an aside, white women do this too–too often we center ourselves in movements created by black women. We enthusiastically profess our allyship and excitedly show all that we’ve learned without ever realizing we’re talking over black women. We co-opt their stories, their activism, even their terminology and then pat ourselves on the back for being Such Great Allies. Beware of people who do this. True allyship is knowing when to listen and let others have the podium. It’s showing up in hostile places and spaces and doing the work even if no one sees you doing it.

        Baldoni’s curated image is a red flag to me: all performative, try-hard and ultimately disingenuous.

  14. wordnerd says:

    None of us know all of the ins and outs of this situation. We’re all being swayed by PR leaks and very one-sided narratives, making it easy to pick a side depending on who and what you follow online. They both seem messy as hell and I for one am enjoying this drama way more than any Colleen Hoover novel could ever deliver.

  15. Coco Bean says:

    Oof, this entire thing is messy. I loved Justin Baldoni’s character in Jane the Virgin and this is a good reminder to separate the actor from the character. Never been a Blake fan, she’s an ok but tone-deaf actress.

    I look at the publications to tell me all I need to know in a situation like this. Daily Mail? TMZ? FOX News? These are not outlets that are going to do unbiased reporting, they support right-wing, men’s rights, MAGA, and conspiracy theories. If these are the outlets Baldoni is using, then I don’t want to be on his side.