Why is Blake Lively so overrated?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they were at war with each other by the end because of creative issues. She basically brought in Ryan to rewrite scenes and took over editing, in violation of the director’s guild rules, to get the version she wanted. Any retailiation was over that (and let’s be honest, they both were campaigning against the other via their pr team ) not sexual harassment. But creative differences doesn’t provide a cause of action.

This is what I had assumed happened when the rift became obvious during promotion of the movie. Creative differences that came to ahead because he's still a newbie director and she has more pull than your average leading lady thanks to Reynolds.

However her lawsuit has me questioning that narrative. I mean, maybe her allegations in the lawsuit are all trumped up and taken out of context, and the whole thing is a ruse for getting him to sell the rights to the sequel to Lively and Reynolds. That's still a possibility.

But her lawsuit is very *complete* in its portrayal of a toxic work environment that was particularly bad regarding nudity/intimacy on the set and treating actors respectfully. If what Lively is alleging there is true, then Baldoni and Wayfarer ran a super unprofessional set where actors were particularly compromised during intimate scenes, pressured to do more intimacy/nudity than was in the script, and generally just treated poorly. If that's accurate, then I think it's likely that the rewriting/inserting of scenes by Lively and Reynolds, and Lively having Reynolds do his own cut of the movie and pressuring Sony to release that version, was done to try and reclaim some control over the intimate and nude content in the movie. Which, if her allegations are truthful, I totally understand. The way her complaint describes the filming of the birth scene is totally unacceptable -- I would absolutely support an actress in demanding that she have more control over editing of a scene that was filmed that way, with her pressured to do nudity she wasn't comfortable with, the set kept open, no IC on set, and the director's buddy hired to play the doctor and hang out right next to her genitals. If all that is accurate, Baldoni deserved to have creative control of the movie taken away, IMO.

But again, *if* it's true. Baldoni says there is context missing. I'm willing to wait and hear what that is. Because there is another narrative where this is just about creative differences and control, I'm staying open minded. They need to present their evidence. But I do think Livley has presented a viable alternative narrative that really casts a lot of doubt on that creative differences narrative that prevailed over the summer when the movie came out.

Well, she has to make allegations like that to state a cause of action. But a lot of what you wrote makes no sense, an actress doesn’t have control over editing any scene. Whether the actor was a friend of Justin’s or not doesn’t matter one way or another. Bit parts often go to friends of the directors. You really think men are campaigning to be near Blake in a birthing scene in which she was wearing a prosthetic belly and surrounded by other actors and crew? To me, that paragraph a sign of her overinflated ego, assuming every male is irresistibly drawn to her sexually.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It doesn’t really matter how he wanted to tell it, he bought the rights, and was the director. Blake wasn’t entitled to any particular version of it, she just had a heavy weight husband throw his weight around to get the version she wanted.

I don’t think the harassment claims are going to be supported by evidence. They wanted to go with a retaliation claim and that necessitated the harassment allegations.

When he pushes nudity on her that was unplanned and unexpected, he can't just throw his weight around.

You do not understand what the word allegations means.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It doesn’t really matter how he wanted to tell it, he bought the rights, and was the director. Blake wasn’t entitled to any particular version of it, she just had a heavy weight husband throw his weight around to get the version she wanted.

I don’t think the harassment claims are going to be supported by evidence. They wanted to go with a retaliation claim and that necessitated the harassment allegations.

When he pushes nudity on her that was unplanned and unexpected, he can't just throw his weight around.

You do not understand what the word allegations means.

Such as her husband calling the shots? You're just speculating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It doesn’t really matter how he wanted to tell it, he bought the rights, and was the director. Blake wasn’t entitled to any particular version of it, she just had a heavy weight husband throw his weight around to get the version she wanted.

I don’t think the harassment claims are going to be supported by evidence. They wanted to go with a retaliation claim and that necessitated the harassment allegations.

When he pushes nudity on her that was unplanned and unexpected, he can't just throw his weight around.

You do not understand what the word allegations means.

Such as her husband calling the shots? You're just speculating.

I’m not. It isn’t disputed that Ryan rewrote scenes, we know that because Blake said it. It isnt disputed that Blake throw out the original wardrobe for her character and chose a totally different one. It isn’t disputed that both she and Justin edited different versions of the film and both were shown to test audiences. It isn’t disputed that she had a film editor fired and kicked Justin and his team out of the editing process, there are texts that show that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one cares. There are thousands of people without homes in California. Who cares about a bunch of Hollywood brats.

Correct. Now that thousands have lost their homes, including many prominent Holywood actors, no one cares about this he said/ she said drama.

Yet you took the time to post this.

That's right!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It doesn’t really matter how he wanted to tell it, he bought the rights, and was the director. Blake wasn’t entitled to any particular version of it, she just had a heavy weight husband throw his weight around to get the version she wanted.

I don’t think the harassment claims are going to be supported by evidence. They wanted to go with a retaliation claim and that necessitated the harassment allegations.

When he pushes nudity on her that was unplanned and unexpected, he can't just throw his weight around.

You do not understand what the word allegations means.

Such as her husband calling the shots? You're just speculating.

I’m not. It isn’t disputed that Ryan rewrote scenes, we know that because Blake said it. It isnt disputed that Blake throw out the original wardrobe for her character and chose a totally different one. It isn’t disputed that both she and Justin edited different versions of the film and both were shown to test audiences. It isn’t disputed that she had a film editor fired and kicked Justin and his team out of the editing process, there are texts that show that.

We don't have to stick to facts and not allegations when talking about Baldoni when Blake's past sex life is continually brought up completely devoid of facts. It's all fair game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they were at war with each other by the end because of creative issues. She basically brought in Ryan to rewrite scenes and took over editing, in violation of the director’s guild rules, to get the version she wanted. Any retailiation was over that (and let’s be honest, they both were campaigning against the other via their pr team ) not sexual harassment. But creative differences doesn’t provide a cause of action.

This is what I had assumed happened when the rift became obvious during promotion of the movie. Creative differences that came to ahead because he's still a newbie director and she has more pull than your average leading lady thanks to Reynolds.

However her lawsuit has me questioning that narrative. I mean, maybe her allegations in the lawsuit are all trumped up and taken out of context, and the whole thing is a ruse for getting him to sell the rights to the sequel to Lively and Reynolds. That's still a possibility.

But her lawsuit is very *complete* in its portrayal of a toxic work environment that was particularly bad regarding nudity/intimacy on the set and treating actors respectfully. If what Lively is alleging there is true, then Baldoni and Wayfarer ran a super unprofessional set where actors were particularly compromised during intimate scenes, pressured to do more intimacy/nudity than was in the script, and generally just treated poorly. If that's accurate, then I think it's likely that the rewriting/inserting of scenes by Lively and Reynolds, and Lively having Reynolds do his own cut of the movie and pressuring Sony to release that version, was done to try and reclaim some control over the intimate and nude content in the movie. Which, if her allegations are truthful, I totally understand. The way her complaint describes the filming of the birth scene is totally unacceptable -- I would absolutely support an actress in demanding that she have more control over editing of a scene that was filmed that way, with her pressured to do nudity she wasn't comfortable with, the set kept open, no IC on set, and the director's buddy hired to play the doctor and hang out right next to her genitals. If all that is accurate, Baldoni deserved to have creative control of the movie taken away, IMO.

But again, *if* it's true. Baldoni says there is context missing. I'm willing to wait and hear what that is. Because there is another narrative where this is just about creative differences and control, I'm staying open minded. They need to present their evidence. But I do think Livley has presented a viable alternative narrative that really casts a lot of doubt on that creative differences narrative that prevailed over the summer when the movie came out.

Well, she has to make allegations like that to state a cause of action. But a lot of what you wrote makes no sense, an actress doesn’t have control over editing any scene. Whether the actor was a friend of Justin’s or not doesn’t matter one way or another. Bit parts often go to friends of the directors. You really think men are campaigning to be near Blake in a birthing scene in which she was wearing a prosthetic belly and surrounded by other actors and crew? To me, that paragraph a sign of her overinflated ego, assuming every male is irresistibly drawn to her sexually.

Normally an actress doesn't have control over editing, correct. That's why when I heard that Lively and Reynolds were writing scenes and editing the movie, it sounded like massive overreach. Everyone thought that. And everyone assumed that the reason Sony went along with it was because Reynolds is pretty powerful in the industry and they didn't want to piss him off. That's absolutely what I thought for a long time.

And look, it if turns out that they've made up the allegations in her complaint just to make Baldoni look bad and try to justify taking over creative control of the project, I think that will come out of the litigation. If there isn't a settlement, there will be testimony by other cast members, the intimacy coordinator, ADs and other crew members, etc. But *if* it went down as her complaint alleges, then I support her in intervening with the creative process regarding the script and editing. Because if it happened that way, it violates industry standards regarding nudity/intimacy on the set and it was harassment. She has to prove it, but if she does, I don't have a problem with Lively taking control over final cut of the movie. I don't think an actress who has been pressured into doing nudity and unscripted intimacy, without the protection of an IC on set during those scenes, should just have to accept however the director wants to edit those scenes.

We'll have to wait and see which narrative is true. We really don't know yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one cares. There are thousands of people without homes in California. Who cares about a bunch of Hollywood brats.

Correct. Now that thousands have lost their homes, including many prominent Holywood actors, no one cares about this he said/ she said drama.

Yet you took the time to post this.

I would really enjoy if Blake did a press conference about the pain and misfortune she has endured. Fire is nothing compared to her deep abiding pain.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one cares. There are thousands of people without homes in California. Who cares about a bunch of Hollywood brats.

Correct. Now that thousands have lost their homes, including many prominent Holywood actors, no one cares about this he said/ she said drama.

Yet you took the time to post this.

I would really enjoy if Blake did a press conference about the pain and misfortune she has endured. Fire is nothing compared to her deep abiding pain.

I'm sure Angelina Jolie can scratch that itch for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I think Blake/Ryan wanted to film it as a romance movie for Blake and Justin wanted to stick to the book and highlight the dv aspect. That was the fundamental disagreement, and their desire to take control. The other complaints were just trumped up to get their way. Would be very interested in seeing his cut.

Colleen Hoover seemed more than ok with the Blake interpretation.

Hoover's books romanticize the heck out of DV and other problematic red flags. I bet that was her idea as well.

I have read that he was trying to take a strong male POV with a redemption arc and generally the cast including Lively, along with Hoover, frequently disagrees with how he wanted to portray things or felt he was not realistically accounting for the female POV. But I also do not know if what I read is planted PR so take it all with a big piece of rock salt.

And also that when they disagreed, he also heavily into method acting so identified so strongly with his character he became a jerk. But again, take it all with lots of salt.

I thought he said he was trying to tell it from the female POV while overriding actual female input. See: birthing scene.

Who knows at this point

He's a proud male feminist so it makes perfect sense that he think he would know best.

Maybe just following playbook of Harvey Weinstein’s whose narrative as he was heading to jail was that he had done more for women directors and pay equality for women than anyone else and all his good work for women was being ignored. Or that guy from 70s show who had Ashton and Mila tell judge for him at his sentencing on how nice he was to women as far as they knew.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I think Blake/Ryan wanted to film it as a romance movie for Blake and Justin wanted to stick to the book and highlight the dv aspect. That was the fundamental disagreement, and their desire to take control. The other complaints were just trumped up to get their way. Would be very interested in seeing his cut.

Colleen Hoover seemed more than ok with the Blake interpretation.

Hoover's books romanticize the heck out of DV and other problematic red flags. I bet that was her idea as well.

I have read that he was trying to take a strong male POV with a redemption arc and generally the cast including Lively, along with Hoover, frequently disagrees with how he wanted to portray things or felt he was not realistically accounting for the female POV. But I also do not know if what I read is planted PR so take it all with a big piece of rock salt.

And also that when they disagreed, he also heavily into method acting so identified so strongly with his character he became a jerk. But again, take it all with lots of salt.

I thought he said he was trying to tell it from the female POV while overriding actual female input. See: birthing scene.

Who knows at this point

He's a proud male feminist so it makes perfect sense that he think he would know best.

Maybe just following playbook of Harvey Weinstein’s whose narrative as he was heading to jail was that he had done more for women directors and pay equality for women than anyone else and all his good work for women was being ignored. Or that guy from 70s show who had Ashton and Mila tell judge for him at his sentencing on how nice he was to women as far as they knew.

This is why anyone who makes their whole identity "male feminism" should raise several red flags.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I think Blake/Ryan wanted to film it as a romance movie for Blake and Justin wanted to stick to the book and highlight the dv aspect. That was the fundamental disagreement, and their desire to take control. The other complaints were just trumped up to get their way. Would be very interested in seeing his cut.

Colleen Hoover seemed more than ok with the Blake interpretation.

Hoover's books romanticize the heck out of DV and other problematic red flags. I bet that was her idea as well.

I have read that he was trying to take a strong male POV with a redemption arc and generally the cast including Lively, along with Hoover, frequently disagrees with how he wanted to portray things or felt he was not realistically accounting for the female POV. But I also do not know if what I read is planted PR so take it all with a big piece of rock salt.

And also that when they disagreed, he also heavily into method acting so identified so strongly with his character he became a jerk. But again, take it all with lots of salt.

I thought he said he was trying to tell it from the female POV while overriding actual female input. See: birthing scene.

Who knows at this point

He's a proud male feminist so it makes perfect sense that he think he would know best.

Maybe just following playbook of Harvey Weinstein’s whose narrative as he was heading to jail was that he had done more for women directors and pay equality for women than anyone else and all his good work for women was being ignored. Or that guy from 70s show who had Ashton and Mila tell judge for him at his sentencing on how nice he was to women as far as they knew.

This is why anyone who makes their whole identity "male feminism" should raise several red flags.

+1, and Baldoni has profited extensively off this identity in a way that people should have questioned even before this whole fiasco with Lively.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I think Blake/Ryan wanted to film it as a romance movie for Blake and Justin wanted to stick to the book and highlight the dv aspect. That was the fundamental disagreement, and their desire to take control. The other complaints were just trumped up to get their way. Would be very interested in seeing his cut.

Colleen Hoover seemed more than ok with the Blake interpretation.

Hoover's books romanticize the heck out of DV and other problematic red flags. I bet that was her idea as well.

I have read that he was trying to take a strong male POV with a redemption arc and generally the cast including Lively, along with Hoover, frequently disagrees with how he wanted to portray things or felt he was not realistically accounting for the female POV. But I also do not know if what I read is planted PR so take it all with a big piece of rock salt.

And also that when they disagreed, he also heavily into method acting so identified so strongly with his character he became a jerk. But again, take it all with lots of salt.

I thought he said he was trying to tell it from the female POV while overriding actual female input. See: birthing scene.

Who knows at this point

He's a proud male feminist so it makes perfect sense that he think he would know best.

Maybe just following playbook of Harvey Weinstein’s whose narrative as he was heading to jail was that he had done more for women directors and pay equality for women than anyone else and all his good work for women was being ignored. Or that guy from 70s show who had Ashton and Mila tell judge for him at his sentencing on how nice he was to women as far as they knew.

There were rumors about these guys for years. Same with Johnny Depp.

[Anonymous]

I think what people are missing here is that she really doesn’t have a case of sexual harassment, her case is about retaliation. Or course she has to establish harassment which I believe she has. It seems like there was inappropriate behavior and harassment during the first half of the shoot before the writer strike. Blake’s team acted appropriately, organized a meeting, had a list of grievances, presented them to Justin and Jamie, and they agreed to move forward. It’s my understanding that they did and there was no more inappropriate behavior during the rest of the shoot. So there’s really no court case because it was handled how it should be handled to avoid it going to court.

Blake’s case isn’t about sexual harassment anymore, it’s about retaliation because claims of sexual harassment were brought up. But the problem is, it seems like the rest of the shoot, she took total control of the movie, violating norms and standards and the directors guild by taking over editing, bullying her way into getting an executive producer credit, which seems to be extortion given the tens of millions of dollars she would’ve made from that title.

Then she iced Justin out off the Premier in a very public way. I don’t blame him for hiring a crisis' PR management company - Who wouldn’t? But I don’t think he did it for retaliation against sexual harassment, I believe he did it because she was going scorched earth on his reputation.

I think it’s going to be hard to show that the PR firm went beyond what is legal in their job. There is no question that a lot of the big influencers who were getting clicks off this controversy were not paid, they were doing it because it was a great clickbait. A ton of influencers make money off of positive content about Blake and Ryan couple - their cute couplehood, Blake‘s fashion, whatever. And just as many are making money off of a scandal like this, putting up their hot takes, putting up gossip. It’s going to be really hard to prove that an agency was responsible for most of that when tons of people are getting clicks off this that were not paid by the agency. And perhaps the biggest hit to Blake’s reputation came from the 2016 baby bump interview which the reporter has come out and said she was never contacted by anyone.

I think there was harassment on the set, I think it was addressed an appropriate way, kudos to blake for raising it and having it addressed professionally. But it’s very hard to justify her taking over creative control like she did, in ways that don’t seem at all appropriate, and for her really publicly trying to ruin his reputation the way the marketing and the premier were handled.

I don’t see this ever going to court, I don’t see people ever being deposed, they are going to settle because I don’t think either of them wants all the texts and things coming out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they were at war with each other by the end because of creative issues. She basically brought in Ryan to rewrite scenes and took over editing, in violation of the director’s guild rules, to get the version she wanted. Any retailiation was over that (and let’s be honest, they both were campaigning against the other via their pr team ) not sexual harassment. But creative differences doesn’t provide a cause of action.

This is what I had assumed happened when the rift became obvious during promotion of the movie. Creative differences that came to ahead because he's still a newbie director and she has more pull than your average leading lady thanks to Reynolds.

However her lawsuit has me questioning that narrative. I mean, maybe her allegations in the lawsuit are all trumped up and taken out of context, and the whole thing is a ruse for getting him to sell the rights to the sequel to Lively and Reynolds. That's still a possibility.

But her lawsuit is very *complete* in its portrayal of a toxic work environment that was particularly bad regarding nudity/intimacy on the set and treating actors respectfully. If what Lively is alleging there is true, then Baldoni and Wayfarer ran a super unprofessional set where actors were particularly compromised during intimate scenes, pressured to do more intimacy/nudity than was in the script, and generally just treated poorly. If that's accurate, then I think it's likely that the rewriting/inserting of scenes by Lively and Reynolds, and Lively having Reynolds do his own cut of the movie and pressuring Sony to release that version, was done to try and reclaim some control over the intimate and nude content in the movie. Which, if her allegations are truthful, I totally understand. The way her complaint describes the filming of the birth scene is totally unacceptable -- I would absolutely support an actress in demanding that she have more control over editing of a scene that was filmed that way, with her pressured to do nudity she wasn't comfortable with, the set kept open, no IC on set, and the director's buddy hired to play the doctor and hang out right next to her genitals. If all that is accurate, Baldoni deserved to have creative control of the movie taken away, IMO.

But again, *if* it's true. Baldoni says there is context missing. I'm willing to wait and hear what that is. Because there is another narrative where this is just about creative differences and control, I'm staying open minded. They need to present their evidence. But I do think Livley has presented a viable alternative narrative that really casts a lot of doubt on that creative differences narrative that prevailed over the summer when the movie came out.

Well, she has to make allegations like that to state a cause of action. But a lot of what you wrote makes no sense, an actress doesn’t have control over editing any scene. Whether the actor was a friend of Justin’s or not doesn’t matter one way or another. Bit parts often go to friends of the directors. You really think men are campaigning to be near Blake in a birthing scene in which she was wearing a prosthetic belly and surrounded by other actors and crew? To me, that paragraph a sign of her overinflated ego, assuming every male is irresistibly drawn to her sexually.

Yeah, I feel bad if she was treated inappropriately in that scene, but the man who played the OB/GYN was perfectly qualified. You can look him up online, he has 2 degrees in theater or something related to that, he toured for over a decade with a British theater company, and he’s been steadily working in small roles for years.

That said, why not just hire a woman in that role and make everyone more comfortable?