Hollywood has a lot to say about Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s ongoing It Ends With Us legal drama.
“It is important in times like these to have a distraction, and that’s why I want to personally extend my gratitude to Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively,” Chelsea Handler joked while hosting the 2025 Critics Choice Awards on February 7. “Thank you for providing us with that distraction. I’m grateful. I think we’re all grateful and I think we’re good.”
That distraction started when Lively filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against the director in December 2024, months after speculation spread that Lively and Baldoni butted heads on the set of the August 2024 book adaptation. Among her many claims, she accused Baldoni of making inappropriate comments, attempting to add additional sex scenes into the film and allegedly launching a smear campaign against her to damage her reputation. In the amended lawsuit filed February 18, Lively also claimed Baldoni’s behavior made other women on set “uncomfortable.”
Baldoni refuted Lively’s claims by filing a $250 million lawsuit against The New York Times — which first reported on Lively’s filing — later that month and a $400 million lawsuit against Lively, her husband, Ryan Reynolds, and her publicist, Leslie Sloane.
Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s reported rift made headlines months before the It Ends With Us costars filed lawsuits. While Lively and Baldoni promoted the film in August 2024, rumors began swirling of an alleged feud between the pair. Fans noticed that Lively was promoting the movie with some of her costars while Baldoni, who […]
In his lawsuits, Baldoni claimed that Lively’s text screenshots about the alleged smear campaign omitted context. He also accused Lively of attempting to take over creative control of the film despite his role as director, as well as claimed she attempted to ban him from the film’s marketing and New York City premiere.
Both sides, as well as The New York Times, have vehemently denied the other’s allegations. The pair’s trial is scheduled to begin on March 9, 2026.
While other celebs have vocalized support for Lively (click here for a roundup), others seem ready for the drama to end. Below is how Hollywood has weighed in on the ongoing back-and-forth between the former costars:
Kate Hudson
When asked what’s on her social media “for you pages” in a February 24 interview with Betches, Hudson joked that her “shameful” suggested feed has been taken over by Baldoni and Lively’s conflict.
“Apparently, I’m just interested in before and afters, anybody who’s ever threaded their face, Justin [Baldoni] and Blake Lively, and I get a lot of hooded eye makeup tutorials.”
Chelsea Handler
During her Critics Choice Awards opening monologue, Handler also poked fun at the title of It Ends With Us, stating, “I think everybody in this room, no matter whose side you’re on, we can all agree to accept that there’s probably not going to be a sequel. It ends with us, guys.”
In a February 24 interview with Page Six, Handler stated that the legal drama has become “such a frenzy” because Lively and Baldoni “keep releasing more and more stuff.” Despite finding it all “interesting,” Handler said that she was ready for the fight to come to an end.
“It’s like you have to break up a fight in a schoolyard playground,” she quipped. “It’s like, ‘Don’t they know to stop?’ Isn’t someone saying, ‘Stop it!’?’”
Judd Apatow
Apatow poked fun at Lively and Baldoni while praising Wicked during his opening monologue at the 77th Annual Directors Guild of America Awards. “It was the highest-grossing movie musical of all time. Do you know that?” he said. “Usually, to make that much money, you have to sue Blake Lively.”
According to People, Apatow went on to ask why so much fuss has been made “over such a terrible movie.”
Lorne Michaels
Reynolds referenced his and Lively’s legal battle against Baldoni during Saturday Night Live’s 50th anniversary special on February 16. When asked by Tina Fey and Amy Poehler how he was doing, he responded, “[I’m doing] great. Why, what have you heard?”
Dana Carvey later revealed on his “Fly on the Wall” podcast that while he congratulated the show’s creator, Lorne Michaels, on the special via text, Michaels only wanted to talk about Lively and Baldoni.
“Instead of talking about the show, he just goes, ‘Baldoni will now countersue. I think that Lively will probably get a new attorney,’” Carvey shared. Recalling another of Michaels’ texts, he continued, “‘I don’t know where Ryan Reynolds is on this, but certainly they have deep pockets.’”
Bethenny Frankel
In a January 8 TikTok video, the Bravolebrity recalled following Baldoni into a theater at the NYC premiere of It Ends With Us, assuming that was where the screening would be held. “Always, unless it’s a weird, different screening, the premiere is in one giant theater and there might be an overflow theater. But here, he’s in one theater, something’s going on somewhere else,” she shared. “So they take us and they put us all the way to the left in this theater where nobody was. It felt like everyone was separated.”
Frankel noted that the “vibes were not vibing” and that she hadn’t spoken up about it out of fear of being “canceled.” She proceeded to call her publicist and left the premiere. “It felt like I was doing something wrong, but it felt like I was doing something right. Something was f—ed.”
One month later, she called Reynolds’ SNL 50 joke about the lawsuits “absolutely brilliant” via TikTok. “[SNL is] the epicenter of pop culture. It is the zeitgeist. Bullseye,” she gushed. “For Ryan and Blake to participate is nothing short of genius because the only way to weather a storm is to go straight through it.”
She went on to clarify, “As I keep saying, no one knows what actually happened. So, all of the speculation is tricky and risky business, but that was very smart. Bravo.”
Nikki Glaser
Glaser gave her two cents on the Lively and Baldoni drama when asked if she would be making a joke about the lawsuits while hosting the 2025 Golden Globes. “I think the Blake Lively-Justin Baldoni thing is such a hot-button thing right now that even a mere mention of it will seem like I could be on the wrong side of things, even though I would never be,” she told Yahoo! Entertainment on January 2. “I also don’t want to give his name any [weight]. I’m mad I even know his name, to be honest with you, so I don’t need to say it anymore.”
