Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni Settle ‘It Ends With Us’ Lawsuit Weeks Before Trial

Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni have settled their contentious legal dispute tied to their film It Ends With Us just weeks before it was scheduled to head to trial. 

In a joint statement shared with Rolling Stone, lawyers for Baldoni’s production company Wayfarer Studios and Lively said, “The end product — the movie It Ends With Us — is a source of pride to all of us who worked to bring it to life. Raising awareness, and making a meaningful impact in the lives of domestic violence survivors — and all survivors — is a goal that we stand behind.”

They continued: “We acknowledge the process presented challenges and recognize concerns raised by Ms. Lively deserved to be heard. We remain firmly committed to workplaces free of improprieties and unproductive environments. It is our sincere hope that this brings closure and allows all involved to move forward constructively and in peace, including a respectful environment online.” 

While details of the settlement are unknown, Baldoni is especially happy with the outcome, Rolling Stone has learned.

Jury selection for the highly-anticipated trial was slated to begin Monday, May 18, and the trial was expected to last between six to eight weeks. Both parties seemed ready for court proceedings to finally kick off, with court submissions being filed as recently as last Friday. 

The protracted legal battle dates back to Lively’s claims that Baldoni and Wayfarer fostered a toxic, sexually-charged work environment that discriminated against women on the set of It Ends With Us. Lively also alleged that Baldoni and the film’s producers orchestrated a smear campaign to “silence” and “eviscerate” the actress. 

Baldoni and Wayfarer denied Lively’s claims and took legal action of their own. Baldoni filed a $400 million countersuit against Lively, accusing her of defamation, though that was eventually dismissed. He also sued The New York Times for defamation over their story, which broke the news of Lively’s original sexual harassment complaint against Baldoni. But that suit was also dismissed. 

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For all the allegations thrown around over the past couple of years, the scope of the case had narrowed significantly. Earlier this month, the judge dismissed 10 of Lively’s 13 claims — including allegations of sexual harassment — meaning the trial was set to focus primarily on retaliation and breach of contract.

The drama around it Ends With Us began way back in the summer of 2024, during the lead up to the film’s release. At the time, fans noticed that Baldoni — who directed and co-starred in the film — was doing a lot of solo interviews, while Lively, the other main star, was appearing alongside her castmates and Colleen Hoover (the best-selling author who wrote the book the film was based on). After Baldoni and Lively did not pose together on the red carpet at the film’s premiere that August, both internet speculation and behind-the-scenes maneuvering picked up quickly. 

For months, however, there was little more than rumor and online chatter (which may have, it should be noted, helped turn It Ends With Us into a box office smash). Then, in December 2024, Lively accused Baldoni of sexually harassing her on the set of it Ends With Us and orchestrating a smear campaign against her during the film’s press roll out. These claims were first leveled in a precursor complaint filed with the California Civil Rights Department, though Lively eventually filed a lawsuit in the Southern District of New York.  

Baldoni, for his part, rebuffed Lively’s claims. In his lawsuit, he accused her of effectively trying to seize creative control over It Ends With Us by threatening to walk off the film if she did not get her way. At one point, Baldoni even claimed that Lively used her friend, Taylor Swift, to pressure him into accepting a rewrite of a key scene in the film. (A Swift spokesperson said in May 2025 that Baldoni had been trying to use the pop star’s name to draw public interest and create clickbait during the case; efforts to depose Swift failed, too, and were eventually dropped.) 
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As for Baldoni’s suit, when the judge dismissed it last June, he ruled that the actor/director had ultimately failed to prove that Lively’s actions during filming were “wrongful extortion rather than legally permissible hard bargaining or renegotiation of working conditions.” He also said that Baldoni had failed to show Lively had defamed him in any way, besides what she said in her filing with the California Civil Rights Department, which was privileged and protected. 

Despite the narrowed scope, the version of the Lively/Baldoni case that was to be presented before a Manhattan jury was still shaping up to be one of the most intriguing celebrity legal spats in recent memory. At hearings last week, lawyers for both sides squabbled over the admissibility of expert witness testimony, especially tied to Lively’s claims that she suffered between $39 million and $143 million in losses from the it Ends With Us dispute. Baldoni’s lawyers countered, arguing Lively’s work history didn’t support such estimates, and that the four films she’d appeared in over the past eight years had netted her earnings of roughly $21 million.