Justin Baldoni’s Legal Team Decides To Wage A PR War Before Trial
And now this whole thing gets even messier. What started off as something of a Streisand Effect post about Justin Baldoni’s decision to amplify the accusations made against him by Blake Lively has now simply ballooned into something much, much larger. Keep in mind that Lively’s accusations can essentially be distilled down to two main claims: Baldoni engaged in inappropriate workplace behavior of a sexual nature while on the set of the film It Ends With Us, and that Baldoni and his team engaged in a secretive PR battle to generate negative press against Lively in retaliation. As a result of the claims, Lively sued Baldoni and his production company, Baldoni sued both the NY Times for reporting on the claims and Lively and husband Ryan Reynolds for extortion and defamation, and then Baldoni sent a legal hold notice to Marvel and Disney to preserve evidence surrounding a bit character in the latest Deadpool movie that might be a parody of Baldoni.
If this is starting to sound like a flavor of the whole Depp/Heard fiasco from a couple of years ago, you’re not alone. And it seems that some of the same tactics are being employed, at least by Baldoni’s legal team. Were Baldoni to want to address this in as professional a manner possible, it would be simple to do. You don’t comment on the case publicly. Your legal team prepares a vigorous defense reserved for court proceedings. And you certainly don’t do anything that either makes you look defensive, or looks like a version of exactly what you’re accused of, or both.
It appears Baldoni and his legal team have chosen an alternate route, attempting to wage a PR war before the actual legal proceedings have even begun. It starts with Baldoni’s lawyers releasing 10 minutes of footage it claims debunks a central claim of Lively’s concerning inappropriate behavior in a scene from the movie.
The video released is nearly 10 minutes of footage during which Lively and Baldoni are seen filming for a slow dance montage that is referenced in both Lively’s initial complaint with the California Civil Rights Department and a later lawsuit, in which she cited specific instances of what she characterized as inappropriate behavior by Baldoni.
Lively claimed in her December 31 sexual harassment lawsuit against Baldoni that he “leaned forward and slowly dragged his lips from her ear and down her neck as he said, ‘it smells so good,’” a comment the complaint described as not “remotely in character, or based on any dialogue in the script.”
“The following videos captured on May 23, 2023 clearly refute Ms. Lively’s characterization of his behavior,” a statement that precedes the footage provided by Baldoni’s lawyer this week said. “The scene in question was designed to show the two characters falling in love and longing to be close to one another. Both actors are clearly behaving well within the scope of the scene and with mutual respect and professionalism.”
Except, based on Lively’s description and the reporting around what the footage actually shows, it doesn’t “clearly refute” Lively’s description at all. The interpretation of what is occurring in the footage may be ambiguous at best, but this is by no means the smoking gun that Baldoni’s legal team claims it is. This appears instead to be an attempt to publicly frame the evidence in a certain light for, perhaps, the purpose of cementing that framing in some of the eventual jury members at trial.
Lively’s legal team, as you can see, views the footage in an entirely different way.
“Justin Baldoni and his lawyer may hope that this latest stunt will get ahead of the damaging evidence against him, but the video itself is damning,” the statement read. “The video shows Ms. Lively leaning away and repeatedly asking for the characters to just talk. Any woman who has been inappropriately touched in the workplace will recognize Ms. Lively’s discomfort. They will recognize her attempts at levity to try to deflect the unwanted touching. No woman should have to take defensive measures to avoid being touched by their employer without their consent.”
Obviously the appropriate venue to determine which side here is right is a trial. Not the court of public opinion. Except that appears to be exactly where Baldoni and his legal team want to air all of this currently. And if that doesn’t sound something like one of Lively’s central accusations to you — the attempt to build negative press against Lively as a result of her accusations — then you need to look again, because that is exactly what is happening here.
And it appears it will continue to happen in a manner fully planned out by Baldoni’s lawyers.
Baldoni’s legal representation said Tuesday that they have plans to set up a website that contains more correspondence and video footage that will discredit Lively’s claims.
This is just plain gross. Again, the proper way to handle this is to have this evidence presented at trial, not on some website. And while Lively and her team have not been shy about making public statements about this whole dispute, it is also true that the instigator making this a public fiasco rather than a legal matter has been Baldoni’s side at nearly every turn.
So, sure, this is still a Streisand Effect story or sorts. But it’s also a lot, lot more. It’s a legal team that appears to want to fight and mud-drag Lively using the internet in a PR campaign before it enters the legal arena. There are lots of potential reasons for wanting to engage in that strategy, but none of them are good looks for Baldoni, particularly as they align with Lively’s accusations against him.