Blake Lively privately contacted Ben Affleck in 2024 to express serious concerns about his experience working with Justin Baldoni, newly unsealed court documents reveal, shedding new light on the escalating legal battle surrounding him. It ends with us.
The email, along with text messages involving Taylor Swift and deposition statements from Jenny Slate and Isabela Ferrer, have become part of the growing paper trail linked to Lively’s lawsuit.
According to the documents, Lively sent an email to Affleck on May 17, 2024, describing what she called one of the worst experiences of her career.
She made it clear that the message was delivered without “pressure,” but explained that she was seeking feedback on her own edit of the film after what she described as months of behind-the-scenes turmoil.
“I just experienced the other side (well almost) of the most overwhelming experience I have ever had in a film,” she wrote, adding that the story behind the production was more dramatic than the film itself.
In the same post, Lively claimed that she rewrote and restructured the entire script and effectively directed the film through what she called a “chaotic clown ‘director’/actor/producer/financier/studio head at the center,” emphasizing that it was “the same person.”
She then alleged serious internal problems, including “wild human resources issues and beyond,” and described being placed in a last-minute editing “back-off” after Baldoni worked on her version for months.
Lively asked Affleck if he would be willing to watch the film and offer ratings, even welcoming comments from his family while pointing out the film’s themes of domestic violence.
Highlighting how much the project had cost her emotionally, she wrote, “This movie almost killed me,” adding that she could think of few people she trusted more.
She also mentioned that Ryan Reynolds asked Matt Damon to watch the film, jokingly marveling at the idea of ”Jason Bourne” seeing his work, while expressing gratitude for what she called “good men coming forward.”
The email surfaced amid Lively’s broader lawsuits filed in December 2024, in which she accused Baldoni of sexual harassment and coordinated efforts to damage her reputation.
Baldoni denied the allegations, with his legal team calling them false, and his countersuit was dismissed earlier this year.
The newly released documents offer a deeper look into how isolated and overwhelmed Lively felt as the conflict played out behind closed doors.
