Movies

Ryan Reynolds’ thinly veiled dig at Justin Baldoni amid Blake Lively legal battle

BBG News

As a diehard fan, I can’t help but weigh in on the recent buzz. Ryan Reynolds, in a subtle jab, dismissed the backlash he and his former spouse, Blake Lively, have faced in their legal tussle with Justin Baldoni, the director of “The It Ends With Us,” as insignificant or meaningless.

In simpler terms, the individual stated, ‘I’ve read statements like “He deserves to be drawn and quartered” or “I should receive a Nobel Prize.” Regardless, these phrases hold no significance,’ the Canadian expressed dismissively in his TIME100 feature article on Thursday.

We’re not made up exclusively of our finest hours, nor are we confined to our darkest ones. Instead, we embody a blend of both.

The magazine recognized Ryan’s combined venture, Maximum Effort Production and Marketing, as one of the ‘top 100 influential companies.’ Yet, he maintains that his business hasn’t suffered significantly due to the ongoing lawsuits.

‘Accessibility and accountability are a big part of how I do things,’ Reynolds noted.

In the team I work with, everyone knows me well enough that there’s no room for doubt or misunderstanding. If you maintain strong core values and act with integrity, your colleagues will support you. Conversely, if you behave in a rude or disrespectful manner, they won’t. This concept is quite straightforward.

This individual, often referred to as a ‘people pleaser’, emphasized that his sense of value stems primarily from his role as a father of four and his strong marriage. He finds little personal worth in anything outside the domestic sphere of his household.

Ryan accused Justin of being a ‘person who behaves inappropriately in a sexual manner’ as his wife, aged 37, claimed she experienced sexual harassment from him during the filming of “It Ends with Us”. She reported this incident to the California Civil Rights Department on December 20.

However, Megan Twohey, the New York Times journalist responsible for writing Blake’s exposé in December, stated on NPR with Ari Shapiro last December that Baldoni’s alleged sexual misconduct towards her was not extremely serious.

As an ardent admirer putting it in my own words: ‘He shared with me a revelation, something like, “Hey, you know, what happened to me wasn’t even the tip of the iceberg in Hollywood. I’ve faced situations way worse than this. I chose to speak up because I felt it needed addressing, and I thought I had done so, but I never intended for it to go public or become a topic of discussion.”‘

On June 9th, Federal Judge Lewis J. Liman threw out the $400 million countersuit filed by Justin and Wayfarer Studios against Reynolds, Lively, and her publicist Leslie Sloane. The lawsuit accused them of civil extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy.

As a dedicated follower, I would express it like this: I too have observed that Liman discarded Baldoni’s defamation lawsuit worth $250M against The New York Times. This was in response to their allegedly biased reporting about the Another Simple Favor star’s CRD complaint and texts obtained from Baldoni’s publicist, Jennifer Abel.

Stephanie Jones acquired Abel’s text messages through a legitimate but covert method: a subpoena issued by the company Vanzan Inc., which is thought to belong to Ryan and Blake, two individuals hailing from Vancouver and Tarzana.

Without a doubt, the intricate aspects of the mysterious subpoena will certainly be scrutinized during Lively’s defamation trial set for March 2026, which is aimed at Justin and his public relations team, as they are accused of devising a strategy to tarnish her reputation in response, through an online slander campaign.

As your trusted lifestyle advisor, I must share that my legal representative, Bryan Freedman, failed to meet the given deadline for revising four out of the initial seven allegations directed at the former Gossip Girl star. However, it seems the star has already celebrated an apparent triumph in this matter.

In a statement issued Tuesday, Freedman clarified that the court ruling to dismiss doesn’t alter the fact that there was no harassment or smear campaign, and it does not impact our resolute defense against Ms. Lively’s allegations in any way.

Progress continues, and we’re optimistic that we’ll successfully overcome these unfounded allegations. Rather than modifying our current arguments, our clients plan to explore further legal avenues open to us.

In my fervor as a dedicated fan, I can’t help but notice an intriguing pattern: none of the talk show titans – Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver – have poked fun at the Lively-Baldoni case since Reynolds’ company Mint Mobile became a sponsor for their 2023 podcast, Strike Force Five. It leaves me wondering if there might be some behind-the-scenes connections at play here.

A former student of Kwantlen Polytechnic University, who made headlines by selling Mint Mobile to T-Mobile for a staggering $1.35 billion in 2023, has also co-owned or sold businesses worth more than $14 billion. In the following year, Forbes placed him as the second highest earning actor of 2024, with an impressive income of $85 million.

Ryan is responsible for creating “I Like Me”, an authorized documentary about the late humorous figure John Candy, starring Colin Hanks. This production will make its debut on September 4 at the Toronto Film Festival, later becoming available to stream on Amazon Prime Video this fall.

In the upcoming U.S. Navy movie titled Mayday, directed by Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, set to premiere on Apple TV+ on September 19th, Hugh Grant takes on both acting and producing roles, sharing the screen with Kenneth Branagh and Maria Bakalova.

The producer-actor of Deadpool and Wolverine is set to take on an enigmatic part in Peter Atencio’s blend of live-action and animation titled Animal Friends. This film will premiere in UK cinemas on October 10, while US audiences can expect it on May 1, 2026.

At the moment, Ryan is working on a script for a film featuring multiple characters, which centers around his witty mercenary persona.

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2025-06-27 03:35

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