For a day, it appeared to be all over. But the Daily Mail can exclusively reveal that the legal hatchet between Blake Lively and erstwhile co-star Justin Baldoni is far from buried.
While Lively, 38, celebrated what looked like a win by dressing up as an old lady for Halloween celebrations with husband Ryan Reynolds, Baldoni’s team have hit back at reports that claimed his $400m It Ends with US lawsuit against Blake was a busted flush due to missed deadlines.
But Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman told the Daily Mail that is wide of the mark and insisted no deadlines had been missed.
The veteran lawyer also revealed that the reason he didn’t file an amended complaint – which led to Judge Lewis Liman entering a final judgement on Monday – was to preserve Baldoni’s right to appeal.
In a statement released exclusively to the Daily Mail, Freedman said: ‘The truth regarding this case continuously and completely gets distorted in the media.
‘Even something as simple as a procedural update has resulted in a total mischaracterization.’
While Lively, 38, celebrated what looked like a win by dressing up as an old lady for Halloween celebrations with husband Ryan Reynolds, Baldoni’s team have hit back at reports that claimed his $400m lawsuit was a busted flush due to missed deadlines
He went on: ‘At this point, we have to set the record straight: no deadlines were missed. Our clients chose not to amend their complaint to preserve appeal rights.
‘In the meantime, we are focusing on Ms. Lively’s claims. We remain fully committed to pursuing the truth through every legal and factual avenue available and look forward to our day in court.’
The long-running legal drama was sparked by Lively’s decision to file a $250m harassment complaint against the It Ends With Us director last December – claiming he had behaved inappropriately towards her on set.
With that came a New York Times expose that saw Baldoni, 41, accused of sexually harassing Lively and claimed the dad-of-two had orchestrated a media smear campaign against his leading lady.
The following month, Baldoni hit back with a $400m lawsuit of his own that accused Lively and the Gray Lady of defamation, with Reynolds also added to the file.
According to Baldoni, Lively had attempted to hijack his film and memorably compared herself to Game of Thrones character Khaleesi – boasting that Reynolds and former pal Taylor Swift are her ‘dragons’.
On Halloween the 38-year-old beauty and her husband Ryan Reynolds had fun dressing up in costumes. They were the old couple Carl and Ellie from the 2009 animated classic film Up
The Gossip Girl star, 38, filed a motion on October 30, accusing the producer of It Ends with Us of ‘failing to comply’ with a court order requiring him to produce the full, now-infamous video of his wife Natasha’s home-birthÂ
The blockbuster case has also seen a welter of claims and counter claims while Swift was also dragged in and was subpoenaed, although that was later canceled.
Much of the current drama in the case now revolves around Lively’s suit – including a recent allegation that the actor allegedly illicitly used technology to orchestrate a smear campaign against his costar.
‘Baldoni and his team of attorneys, agents and public relations professionals used digital tricks to conceal critical evidence in the legal proceedings,’ Lively’s legal team alleged.
The filing went on: ‘Defendants have hid the ball at every turn in the discovery process, either failing to produce documents, or improperly cloaking them in the attorney-client privilege.’
Lively demanded It Ends With Us producer Jamey Heath hand over more footage of his ‘naked’ wife giving birth to their child, in a bizarre twist to her sexual harassment lawsuit, the Daily Mail can exclusively reveal.Â
The Gossip Girl star, 38, filed a motion on October 30, accusing Heath of ‘failing to comply’ with an August 27 court order requiring him to produce the full, now-infamous video of his wife Natasha’s home-birth by September 2.Â
Blake accused Heath of showing her and an assistant his wife’s ‘fully nude’ home-birthing video, which she described as ‘pornography,’ but that the producer and director Justin Baldoni intended to show her their vision of the film’s birthing scene.Â
In her redacted motioned filed with the Southern District court of New York, Lively says Heath – who worked alongside the film’s director and co-star Justin Baldoni – has only provided a three-minute clip, which she ‘has consistently disputed’ is the same ‘inappropriate’ video he showed her on the set of the movie.Â
She claims Heath’s lawyers ‘insisted for weeks that they were ‘not aware’ of any other video’ and that they have ‘refused to provide any further video on the sole basis that, in their view, the Order Compelling Production should be read exceedingly narrowly and does not require Mr Heath to produce it’.
 Lively’s camp also complained about being showered with discovery motions by Baldoni’s team – claiming no fewer than 12 had been submitted.
Lively’s lawyers also claimed that Baldoni and his team worked in concert to try to destroy Lively’s reputation with the use of multiple digital resources, which included the app Signal; voice memos; and other software, lawyers for the Los Angeles-born actress said in the court filing.
All parties have denied the allegations against them
