Blake Lively privately came out to Ben Affleck in 2024 to express serious concerns about her experience working with Justin Baldoni, newly unsealed court documents reveal, shedding new light on the escalating legal battle over It ends with us.
The email, along with text messages involving Taylor Swift and depositions from Jenny Slate and Isabela Ferrer, are now part of the growing paper trail tied to Lively’s lawsuit.
According to the documents, Lively emailed Affleck on May 17, 2024, describing what she called one of the worst experiences of her career.
She made it clear that the message came with “zero pressure”, but explained that she was seeking feedback on her own editing of the film after what she characterized as months of behind-the-scenes turmoil.
“I just came out the other side (well almost) of the most harrowing experience I’ve ever had on a movie,” she wrote, adding that the story behind the production was more dramatic than the film itself.
In the same message, Lively claimed that she rewrote and restructured the entire script, effectively directing the film through what she referred to as a “chaotic clown director”/actor/producer/financier/studio head at the center,” stressing that it was “all the same person.”
She went on to allege serious internal problems, including “wild HR issues and more,” and described being placed in a last-minute edit “bake off” after Baldoni had been working on her version for months.
Lively asked Affleck if he would be willing to watch the film and provide notes, even welcoming feedback from his family while highlighting the film’s themes of domestic violence.
Emphasizing how much the project had cost her emotionally, she wrote, “This movie almost killed me,” adding that she could think of few people whose insight she trusted more.
She also mentioned that Ryan Reynolds had asked Matt Damon to see the film, jokingly marveling at the idea of ”Jason Bourne” seeing her work, while expressing gratitude for what she called “good men who showed up.”
The email emerged amid Lively’s broader legal claims filed in December 2024, in which she accused Baldoni of sexual harassment and a coordinated effort to damage her reputation.
Baldoni has denied the allegations, with his legal team calling them false, and his countersuit was dismissed earlier this year.
The newly released documents offer a deeper look at how isolated and overwhelmed Lively says she felt as the conflict unfolded behind closed doors.
