Things started off so friendly.
A few years ago, Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively started off amicable.
Lively and other actresses from the film have accused Baldoni of wrongdoing. There’s a whole legal war going on.
Just a few months ahead of the trial, a friendly voice message from Baldoni has come out. He praised Lively as “beautiful.”
‘Thank you for sending those pictures’
TMZ has obtained a voice memo from before It Ends With Us began filming.
“Hey Blake,” Baldoni says in the audio recording.
“I hope the fitting was, uh, super successful,” he expresses.
“Thank you for sending those pictures,” Baldoni tells her.
He then praises: “It was really cool.”
Exclusive: Justin Baldoni calls Blake Lively "beautiful" in a voice memo before a film shoot. https://t.co/sSK7HG9bhB pic.twitter.com/v6ClPIEBFE
— TMZ (@TMZ) February 2, 2026
“I was in the department head meeting and they came through,” Baldoni details. “And I was, like, waiting for them to load.”
He raved: “And I legit got the chills when I saw it.”
Baldoni tells Lively: “You look beautiful.”
He concludes by assessing: “It’s gonna work so well.”
That is a very friendly and, in the context of responding to a wardrobe fitting, very professional work interaction. Sadly, the good times did not last.
That’s so different from later communications
Per TMZ‘s reporting, this memo came so far before filming that they had yet to even cast the actress who would portray the younger version of Lively’s character.
(Though that discussion is not public, it was apparently under discussion at the same time)
That is pretty normal. Wardrobe fittings can somehow help to define large portions of the aesthetic of a film.
In many cases, a boss telling someone at work that they are “beautiful” would cross a line.
But this, at least, is pretty normal for the entertainment industry (where evaluating someone’s look in a specific outfit is part of the job!) and sounds professional.
At this point during the movie-making process, it seems that Lively and Baldoni were still friendly.
In fact, Lively referred to Baldoni as a “friend” during another old communication.
They were, at the time, still figuring out the filming schedule.
Obviously, things went downhill pretty dramatically after this.
Lively accuses Baldoni of, among other things, sexual harassment. And she is not the only actress to have filed a complaint.
Their legal war plays out in full force in May
Fast-forward to late 2023, and now-released text messages tell a very different story.
Several disturbing conversations and alleged sexual harassment incidents later, and Lively was clearly counting down the days until the film hit theaters and she could detach herself from Baldoni.
That was before the smear campaign against her overshadowed the actual film.
Lively and Baldoni’s film came out in the summer of 2024. It’s now 2026, and they’re set to go to trial in May.
We’re sure that even more past communications and witness statements will come out at that time.