'It Ends With Us' editor complained 'SMH' about Blake Lively's approval rights for sex scenes, unsealed texts show
"SMH," editor Robb Sullivan told co-editor Oona Flaherty, according to a text chain unsealed Friday as part of Lively's federal sexual-harassment lawsuit against costar and director Justin Baldoni.
In the chain, Sullivan is remarking on Lively having final approval for not only her own sex scenes in the movie, but those of the young actor playing her character's teenage self in flashbacks.
The brief text chain, dated four months before the film's 2024 release, hints at the tension surrounding Lively's demand for control over the most sensitive scenes. It begins with Sullivan and Flaherty celebrating winning a PG-13 rating.
"Woot!" Flaherty texts, to which Sullivan responds, "Woo hoo," and "I'll drink to that! Of course, I was planning on drinking anyways…. :)"
Sullivan is not a party to the lawsuit; he did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
Lively's 163-page lawsuit accuses Baldoni of sexual harassment, retaliation, and attempting to damage her reputation and her lifestyle businesses by orchestrating a surreptitious social media attack campaign.
Baldoni has denied the allegations, including in a now-dismissed $400 million countersuit that alleged she engaged in a "hostile takeover" of the production.
Lively's lawsuit is being aggressively litigated against by Baldoni and his co-defendant production company Wayfarer Studios. In mid-July, the judge ordered Lively to turn over three years of her business income records to Baldoni. Lively's lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial on March 9 in federal court in Manhattan.
The text chain released Friday had originally been turned over to Lively's legal team by Baldoni in response to one of her subpoenas, according to legal filings.
Dated April 18, 2024, it now remains redacted to hide the contact information of the participants. They include a "J B," who does not comment on the exchange, and does not appear to include Lively, who is referred to as "Blake."
"Honestly, it's all about control," a participant identified as "Henny Grace" writes at one point in the chain.
The text chain was originally uploaded to the lawsuit's case file by Lively's team as a sealed exhibit addressed to US District Judge Lewis Liman, the Manhattan judge handling the case. It was part of Lively's efforts to serve Sullivan with a subpoena.
Lively's process server had been unable to serve Sullivan in person after five visits to his California address in mid-July, according to a July 28 decision signed by Liman.
"The process server attempted to serve Sullivan both during the day and after work hours but did not receive an answer, despite lights and television being on in the residence," Liman wrote in allowing the process server to tack a copy of Lively's subpoena to Sullivan's door.
Lively's attempts to serve subpoenas have been the subject of heated litigation in the last month. On July 26, Liman wrote that Lively has withdrawn her subpoenas to Google and X seeking the account information of five content creators who had been critical of her role in the lawsuit. The five content creators had all filed motions to quash Lively's subpoenas.
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