#It Ends with Us

[maaarine]

'We Can Bury Anyone': Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine (Megan Twohey and Mike McIntire and Julie Tate, The New York Times, Dec 21 2024)

"Last summer, as the release of “It Ends With Us” approached, Justin Baldoni, the director and a star of the film, and Jamey Heath, the lead producer, hired a crisis public relations expert.

During shooting, Blake Lively, the co-star, had complained that the men had repeatedly violated physical boundaries and made sexual and other inappropriate comments to her.

Their studio, Wayfarer, agreed to provide a full-time intimacy coordinator, bring in an outside producer and put other safeguards on set.

In a side letter to Ms. Lively’s contract, signed by Mr. Heath, the studio also agreed not to retaliate against the actress.

But by August, the two men, who had positioned themselves as feminist allies in the #MeToo era, expressed fears that her allegations would become public and taint them, according to a legal complaint that she filed Friday.

It claims that their P.R. effort had an explicit goal: to harm Ms. Lively’s reputation instead.

Her filing includes excerpts from thousands of pages of text messages and emails that she obtained through a subpoena.

These and other documents were reviewed by The New York Times. (…)

Mr. Baldoni was best known for the CW satirical romantic dramedy “Jane the Virgin.”

Wayfarer provided the resources for bigger ambitions. It was bankrolled by the billionaire Steve Sarowitz, who is co-chair of the studio with Mr. Baldoni.

They and Mr. Heath, the chief executive, are all deeply involved with the Baha’i religious organization, which promotes unity, peace and gender equality.

Mr. Baldoni has presented himself as an ally to women, writing books, co-hosting a podcast with Mr. Heath and giving talks on toxic masculinity. (…)

She claimed Mr. Baldoni had improvised unwanted kissing and discussed his sex life, including encounters in which he said he may not have received consent.

Mr. Heath had shown her a video of his wife naked, she said, and he had watched Ms. Lively in her trailer when she was topless and having body makeup removed, despite her asking him to look away.

She said that both men repeatedly entered her makeup trailer uninvited while she was undressed, including when she was breastfeeding. (…)

As the film release neared, Ms. Lively and other cast members informed Sony and Wayfarer that they would not do any appearances alongside Mr. Baldoni.

So did Ms. Hoover, the author, who had her own dissatisfactions with him and had become more upset after he told her about Ms. Lively’s allegations, according to text messages from Mr. Baldoni and Mr. Heath.

By the first week of August, Wayfarer and Mr. Baldoni had retained Ms. Nathan, who had worked with high-profile clients including Mr. Depp, whose ex-wife, Amber Heard, accused him of physical abuse. (…)

Three days later, Mr. Baldoni texted Ms. Abel, flagging a social media thread that accused another celebrity of bullying behavior and had generated 19 million views. “This is what we would need,” he wrote.

Ms. Nathan soon floated proposals to hire contractors to dominate social media through “full social account take downs,” by starting “threads of theories” and generally working to “change narrative.”

“All of this will be most importantly untraceable,” she wrote. (…)

When Ms. Abel wrote to her Aug. 4 that “I’m having reckless thoughts of wanting to plant pieces this week of how horrible Blake is to work with. Just to get ahead of it,” Ms. Nathan replied that she had spoken off the record to an editor at The Daily Mail.

“She’s ready when we are,” Ms. Nathan wrote.

A flurry of articles followed the Hollywood Reporter piece. Many made it seem as if the only rift was over creative control.

Some journalists had gotten wind of complaints about Mr. Baldoni’s behavior, but none of the most serious ones were published.

“He doesn’t realise how lucky he is right now,” Ms. Nathan texted Ms. Abel. (…)

It is unclear exactly how Mr. Wallace operated.

There are references in emails to “social manipulation” and “proactive fan posting,” and text messages cite efforts to “boost” and “amplify” online content that was favorable to Mr. Baldoni or critical of Ms. Lively.

“We are crushing it on Reddit,” Mr. Wallace told Ms. Nathan, according to a text she sent Ms. Abel on Aug. 9.

The next day, one of Ms. Nathan’s employees texted, “We’ve started to see shift on social, due largely to Jed and his team’s efforts to shift the narrative.”

Ms. Nathan wrote to Ms. Abel: “And socials are really really ramping up. In his favour, she must be furious. It’s actually sad because it just shows you have people really want to hate on women.” (…)

On Aug. 16, Ms. Nathan shared the Daily Mail article headlined “Is Blake Lively set to be CANCELLED?” with references to ‘hard to watch’ videos and a ‘tone deaf’ promotional Q. and A.

“Wow. You really outdid yourself with this piece,” Ms. Abel responded.

“That’s why you hired me right?” Ms. Nathan replied. “I’m the best.”"

[envelopandkissme]

[killjoyfem]

Blake Lively is currently suing Justin Baldoni for sexually harassing her during the making of “It Ends With Us”, and the response to it is already deeply disappointing, to say the least.

Congratulations to everyone who keeps falling for misogynistic smear campaigns against women and going to battle to defend the abusive men orchestrating them. It is always “believe victims” until it’s a woman you dislike.

[fatalforesight]

Women are allowed to be annoying, bitchy, mean spirited, unkind, lousy, lazy, finicky, anxious, disinterested, disingenuous, disrespectful, and also be believed when they come forward about sexual harassment or assault. Women are allowed to be unliked and also believed. We cannot keep equating our own inability to like someone to our ability or lack thereof to believe them. I don’t see this inability when it comes to men. In fact, I think so many people love a redeeming arc in a man, but hate it seen in women. Why? Why? Why do men get to have comeback stories from things like addiction, theft, bad workplace behavior, even things as heinous as manslaughter… but a woman can’t come back from a bad interview? A bad press junket? A bad relationship? I can’t think of men so hated the way women like Amber Heard and Blake Lively are hated right now. Even beyond them. It’s so easy to hate women right now. Cynthia Erivo, Lea Michele, Jennifer Lopez, Brie Larson, Rachel Zegler, Chappell Roan, Taylor Swift, and so on. I see unprecedented amounts of hate for these women and more nearly everytime they make a headline, but I don’t see the same energy for men. And if any one of them were to come out about sexual harassment or assault, I guarantee I’d have to see more comments about how it doesn’t matter because they’re famous, or how they brought it on themselves, or how they’re probably lying because they need the engagement or sympathy. It is so much more important to believe women than it is to belittle them, even the ones you dislike or distrust. Even if she did lie, I promise you, the men that they “ruin” the career of can always come back. The internet will open their arms to any man with half a jawline or lukewarm wit.

[faithlesslovee]

and they were calling him a feminist king

source

[missinyouiskillingme]

It was hard, being let go by someone who had never really grabbed hold of me completely in the first place.

— Colleen Hoover, It Ends With Us

[taylornation]

we gather here, we line up, weeping as we watch the first look at It Ends With Us. premieres exclusively in theaters august 9. 🩶

[hollywedits]

Blake Lively at the "It Ends With Us" New York Premiere at AMC Lincoln Square Theater on August 06, 2024 in New York City. 

[xoxochb]

every time you reblog, a colleen hoover book gets burnt to crisp

[simplymanuela]

IT ENDS WITH US (2024)

[watmalik]

The spectacular Blake Lively reacting to her husband Ryan Reynolds and his (boy)friend Hugh Jackman (affectionately)

Hugh: I can’t kiss him anymore!

Me: SIR.. I’M GETTING SICK OF THESE MIND GAMES😩

[astrotruther]

Astro Observations

Solar Return Chart

☆ Blake lively having her 12th House in Gemini in her Solar Return Chart & being called out for her tone deaf comments during the press tour of 'It Ends With Us' makes a lot of sense.

☆ Venus in 8th - You could have a higher libido than usual that year. You could also be hesitant to make new friends/ get into relationships due to an increased level of trust issues.

☆ Pisces in 11th - Be careful of the friends you make, some of them may have bad intentions or could inflict lasting emotional wounds.

☆ Sagittarius in 12th - You could face issues at school. Doesn't have to be with teachers or your studies, it could even be your acquaintances/ classmates screwing you over in some way.

☆ Venus in Pisces/ Venus-Neptune aspects might feel like they're getting to express their beauty and other people are subtly taking notice of it. Harsh aspects may feel like their looks are being overly analyzed/ their little flaws are being unnecessarily pointed out by others.

☆ Libra Ascendants might experiment with fashion and truly shine through their personal style. May even have the realization that their looks are more important to them than they previously thought.

☆ Leo Ascendants might experience a boost in hair growth & overall hair health.

☆ Pisces in 8th - Mental health issues will become unavoidable. If you haven't paid attention to stuff that needs to be worked through, your mind will forcefully bring it out to the forefront. Basically, this would be the year you admit to yourself that you need therapy.

☆ Venus Square Mars could develop certain insecurities about their looks, in particular their bodies.

☆ Aquarius Ascendants may not feel accepted in new communities/ spaces. Since Capricorn will fall in their 12th House, they may feel like people are perceiving them in an inaccurate way. Their public image could be particularly challenging that year.

☆ Virgo in 8th - Something about your routine is changing due to external circumstances. The place where you get your coffee every day shutting down, transferring to a new school/ office/ apartment, a break up with friends or your live-in partner.

☆ Pisces in 12th would be closing major karmic cycles and moving on towards a new era where they wouldn't entertain the same toxic narratives again. It's the closing ceremony of all the misery you've faced previously.

Click daily to help Palestinians🍉🙏🏽: https://arab.org/click-to-help/palestine/

[lemurchick]

In my opinion the most important quote from Lively-Baldoni scandal is this one. When even the PR person hired to tarnish a woman’s reputation admits how easy it is because people on the internet so ready to hate women 💁🏻‍♀️

[stfulara]

all this fiasco around 'it ends with us' has made me lose the love I had for Blake Lively- dude branding a movie abt DV as the romcom of the year is just sick and twisted and promoting your new brand instead of actually taking about the issue what are we 2???? lol they even mean girl-ed Justin Baldoni who actually wants to talk about the real issue here- and there's this deadpool x wolverine x it ends with us drama

the fact that young adults would actually romanticize this shitshow is so disheartening, normalizing domestic violence is NOT OKAY

[ad1thi]

Justin baldoni decided to adapt It Ends With Us because he thought that stories about domestic violence, and specifically escaping and life beyond domestic violence deserved to be platformed.

Instead of being supported, he’s been mean girl’d by the cast; that’s treating the film like its this cutesy rom com : and I think this rly encapsulates everything that’s wrong with the book, and the fanbase it’s amassed