Blake Lively- Jason Baldoni and NYT - False Light claims

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

Weird that the great lawyers that Blake has hired have yet to win a discovery motion. And also had a dismal performance at the hearing on the protective order. Here’s a hint, when the judge offers a compromise from the bench, it’s a bad idea to to turn it down.

[Anonymous]

Meanwhile, Freedman for Balboner is already admitting that his complaint is actually written so badly that he will have to amend it probably multiple times again in response to Sloane’s, the NYT’s, and Lively’s motions to dismiss and is begging the judge to just stack up the deficiencies so he won’t have to do the work to amend it 3 separate times. So much billable work, I’m sure Sarowitz is good for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You guys can write all day long about how Jason Baloney hurt Blake Lively's feelings and made her feel uncomfortable.

But I am a gen Xer who does not think that discomfort and hurt feelings are sexual harassment. I think you are being soft whiney babies. In addition, you are ignoring all the power dynamics at play.

Also, workplace harassment comes in different forms than just sexual harassment, and she put them through absolute hell.

As a very powerful woman in Hollywood Blake could’ve taken a stand and handled sexual harassment through proper protocols, and if proper protocols were not meeting her need, she could’ve escalated in other ways. Nothing in the way she handled this is rational or OK.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, Freedman for Balboner is already admitting that his complaint is actually written so badly strategy worked that he will have to amend it probably multiple times again in response to Sloane’s, the NYT’s, and Lively’s motions to dismiss and is begging the judge to just stack up the deficiencies so he won’t have to do the work to amend it 3 separate times. So much billable work, I’m sure Sarowitz is good for it.

Blake has also amended her complaint. Why would he amend three times? Clearly there will be one more iteration.

Has Wallace filed his motion to dismiss yet? That should be coming soon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Laughable, that’s why this all started with her collaboration with The NY Times.

Right?

Blake: I have no interest in litigating this in the press.

Also Blake: get me on the phone with the journalist who represents the entire me too movement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

This piece on Freedman from June of 2024, presumably before he represented Baldoni, is enlightening: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/entertainment-lawyer-bryan-freedman-hollywood-dark-knight-1235919993/

Don't miss the part about his prior relationship with Jed Wallace.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

This piece on Freedman from June of 2024, presumably before he represented Baldoni, is enlightening: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/entertainment-lawyer-bryan-freedman-hollywood-dark-knight-1235919993/

Don't miss the part about his prior relationship with Jed Wallace.

No more clear sign that one side is desperate when they go on tangents like this. Blake has literally nothing for her sex harassment claim and is desperately flailing about trying to find something for retaliation. The subpoenas were fishing expeditions for a reason, she needs a Hail Mary. And unfortunately, it”s not coming via quashed subpoenas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

Which is fine because the evidence gathering phase of the process is only just starting now. Baldoni including a huge timeline in his complaint and creating a website is, uh, unorthodox. I enjoyed it and it cast doubt on most of her claims and got me to side with him, so it worked, but it doesn't really obligate her to provide additional evidence in her complaint. Evidence will be gathered in the form of depositions from parties who were present when her alleged incidents occurred.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

Weird that the great lawyers that Blake has hired have yet to win a discovery motion. And also had a dismal performance at the hearing on the protective order. Here’s a hint, when the judge offers a compromise from the bench, it’s a bad idea to to turn it down.

You only think this because you get all your news on this case from TikTok and YouTube. Lively has had decent success in discovery so far. Right now the Lively/Baldoni parties are actually still in the stage where the judge is requiring them to do motions via letter and the hearings are fairly casual, so I think it's hard to call balls and strikes at this point but both sides have had wins and losses. I know the JB stans will never believe this, but Lively actually won her motion regarding extra-judicial statements (Freedman's litigation of the court via TMZ interview), he just did so by adopting the NY ethics rules governing the matter instead of by issuing Lively's order. The effect is the same -- Freedman is no longer giving interviews about this case and they've stopped "leaking evidence" to the media.

After MTDs it will get more real.

Also, Lively's lead attorney didn't handle the hearing the other day. He was on the call but had another attorney handle it, who is less experienced than he is. This makes a lot of sense because it's an early motion and what they were arguing over was honestly a little pointless. No matter how the judge rules on this motion, they can get things labeled AEO if they want to, this will just determine the procedure for either applying or removing the designation, making it either a little easier or a little harder. It's not a critical motion, so Gottlieb used it as a training exercise. The junior lawyer who argued it did okay, not amazing but not terrible. It was argued virtually, over the phone, so Gottlieb was likely conferring with her throughout the call, passing notes, etc. This is how baby lawyers become grown up lawyers at major law firms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

This piece on Freedman from June of 2024, presumably before he represented Baldoni, is enlightening: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/entertainment-lawyer-bryan-freedman-hollywood-dark-knight-1235919993/

Don't miss the part about his prior relationship with Jed Wallace.

No more clear sign that one side is desperate when they go on tangents like this. Blake has literally nothing for her sex harassment claim and is desperately flailing about trying to find something for retaliation. The subpoenas were fishing expeditions for a reason, she needs a Hail Mary. And unfortunately, it”s not coming via quashed subpoenas.

Tangents, like the people who constantly bring up the Ari interview. Both sides are guilty of this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

This piece on Freedman from June of 2024, presumably before he represented Baldoni, is enlightening: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/entertainment-lawyer-bryan-freedman-hollywood-dark-knight-1235919993/

Don't miss the part about his prior relationship with Jed Wallace.

No more clear sign that one side is desperate when they go on tangents like this. Blake has literally nothing for her sex harassment claim and is desperately flailing about trying to find something for retaliation. The subpoenas were fishing expeditions for a reason, she needs a Hail Mary. And unfortunately, it”s not coming via quashed subpoenas.

It's not a tangent. Lively has hired actual trial attorneys and people with years of experience in these specific types of cases. Michael Gottlieb has a demonstrated interest specifically in online harassment/defamation cases and likely became involved in this case specifically to explore the issues related to Jed Wallace and the retaliation claims, and the texts from Abel's phone are a rare find in a case like that -- here's a chance to actually pull back the curtain on a smear campaign and show how people like JW manipulate public opinion. If you look at his prior cases you'd understand why that would be appealing to him. He didn't come on just to settle right away, no reason to bring in someone with this kind of background on these issues if you want to settle. Lively and Gottlieb want this to get to depositions and maybe even to trial. They want it to get far enough for them to really make the case on the retaliation claim. Lively because she wants to win and Gottlieb because it's a novel area of defamation law that he's working to stake out in his practice.

Freedman is who you hire if you just want to minimize your exposure and settle as fast as possible. He's involved in this case because of the names and profile involved -- his specialty is being able to use and manipulate public opinion and the press to force settlement in high profile cases where the opposing party wants to avoid embarrassment or protracted litigation.

This is not a criticism of anyone here, btw. It's just an observation about which parties are gearing up for trial and which are trying to push settlement. The idea that Lively would hire this legal team if she was just trying to force a quick settlement and put this all behind her doesn't make sense. If that's what she wanted, she'd hire a Freedman-esque lawyer. A Gloria Allred type who would stage press conferences where Lively tearfully recounted how difficult the experience was and would go talk to the dad of the kid who sued Baldoni over copyright or that basketball player who is in litigation with Baldoni over the rights to his life story. But she didn't.

She's not looking to settle. She wants this case to be tried on the merits. Baldoni doesn't, he wants it tried in the court of public opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

Weird that the great lawyers that Blake has hired have yet to win a discovery motion. And also had a dismal performance at the hearing on the protective order. Here’s a hint, when the judge offers a compromise from the bench, it’s a bad idea to to turn it down.

You only think this because you get all your news on this case from TikTok and YouTube. Lively has had decent success in discovery so far. Right now the Lively/Baldoni parties are actually still in the stage where the judge is requiring them to do motions via letter and the hearings are fairly casual, so I think it's hard to call balls and strikes at this point but both sides have had wins and losses. I know the JB stans will never believe this, but Lively actually won her motion regarding extra-judicial statements (Freedman's litigation of the court via TMZ interview), he just did so by adopting the NY ethics rules governing the matter instead of by issuing Lively's order. The effect is the same -- Freedman is no longer giving interviews about this case and they've stopped "leaking evidence" to the media.

After MTDs it will get more real.

Also, Lively's lead attorney didn't handle the hearing the other day. He was on the call but had another attorney handle it, who is less experienced than he is. This makes a lot of sense because it's an early motion and what they were arguing over was honestly a little pointless. No matter how the judge rules on this motion, they can get things labeled AEO if they want to, this will just determine the procedure for either applying or removing the designation, making it either a little easier or a little harder. It's not a critical motion, so Gottlieb used it as a training exercise. The junior lawyer who argued it did okay, not amazing but not terrible. It was argued virtually, over the phone, so Gottlieb was likely conferring with her throughout the call, passing notes, etc. This is how baby lawyers become grown up lawyers at major law firms.

I’m actually a lawyer, which is why I know every bit of what you wrote above is complete and utter nonsense.

The so called “baby lawyer” is a partner at her firm who graduated from law school over a decade ago. She didn't perform badly because she is inexperienced, she just performed badly.

Maybe you should spend some time researching the lawyers on your side instead of just making stuff up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Notice it’s only the Blake supporters writing literally tomes about the need for more evidence. That’s because she doesn’t have near enough at present.

No, it's because they are engaging with the facts instead of just waiving their hands in the general direction of the case and saying "she seems like a liar." Baldoni filed a 224 page complaint, there is much to discuss.

And saying "we haven't seen all the evidence yet" in a case that has not even begun discovery in earnest is just rational. We haven't seen all the evidence yet.

The reason that this is silly is because Blake wants all the evidence out there because she is hemorrhaging followers and supporters. Hollywood is not on her side right now and they would want to get more evidence out if they had it. You ate treating this like a typical court case and it is not. It is a battle for public opinion. She didn’t just quietly file a complaint, she went to the New York Times, got a big splashy story, and made sure they put the complaint on a free PDF site that didn’t require the paywall.

You honestly think they want to wait till March 2026? Come on. In Hollywood that is an eternity. She is just coming off the biggest box office success of her career and she’s not able to capitalize on it. Every day that she’s not seen with Taylor Swift, people speculate more and more that their friendship is over. this period has not been good for Blake at all.

Lively wants the evidence to come out through legal proceedings. She's hired two law firms known for their work in the actual areas of law involved here (Mannatt for employment/entertainment law, and Gottlieb from Wilkie for extensive litigation experience on cases involving defamation and character attacks online). Her hires reflect a desire to actually see this case through via the courts, through a long discovery process and motions to dismiss, for SJ, and potentially trial.

Baldoni has hired a lawyer known for using PR tactics to get huge settlements or get the other side to drop the case due to lack of funds or simply exhaustion. He has very limited trial experience and no real legal specialty other than just generally "entertainment law." He's not well versed in employment, harassment, defamation, first amendment issues, etc. He's handled cases that touch on these issues but largely just to get them settled. He rarely tries cases.

Draw your own conclusions here.

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know Freedman was mostly all bark and very little trial experience. That fits.

Weird that the great lawyers that Blake has hired have yet to win a discovery motion. And also had a dismal performance at the hearing on the protective order. Here’s a hint, when the judge offers a compromise from the bench, it’s a bad idea to to turn it down.

You only think this because you get all your news on this case from TikTok and YouTube. Lively has had decent success in discovery so far. Right now the Lively/Baldoni parties are actually still in the stage where the judge is requiring them to do motions via letter and the hearings are fairly casual, so I think it's hard to call balls and strikes at this point but both sides have had wins and losses. I know the JB stans will never believe this, but Lively actually won her motion regarding extra-judicial statements (Freedman's litigation of the court via TMZ interview), he just did so by adopting the NY ethics rules governing the matter instead of by issuing Lively's order. The effect is the same -- Freedman is no longer giving interviews about this case and they've stopped "leaking evidence" to the media.

After MTDs it will get more real.

Also, Lively's lead attorney didn't handle the hearing the other day. He was on the call but had another attorney handle it, who is less experienced than he is. This makes a lot of sense because it's an early motion and what they were arguing over was honestly a little pointless. No matter how the judge rules on this motion, they can get things labeled AEO if they want to, this will just determine the procedure for either applying or removing the designation, making it either a little easier or a little harder. It's not a critical motion, so Gottlieb used it as a training exercise. The junior lawyer who argued it did okay, not amazing but not terrible. It was argued virtually, over the phone, so Gottlieb was likely conferring with her throughout the call, passing notes, etc. This is how baby lawyers become grown up lawyers at major law firms.

I’m actually a lawyer, which is why I know every bit of what you wrote above is complete and utter nonsense.

The so called “baby lawyer” is a partner at her firm who graduated from law school over a decade ago. She didn't perform badly because she is inexperienced, she just performed badly.

Maybe you should spend some time researching the lawyers on your side instead of just making stuff up.

Being a partner doesn't mean you aren't a baby. This is a high profile case. She's the junior lawyer on the matter.

[Anonymous]

This is not a criticism of anyone here, btw. It's just an observation about which parties are gearing up for trial and which are trying to push settlement. The idea that Lively would hire this legal team if she was just trying to force a quick settlement and put this all behind her doesn't make sense. If that's what she wanted, she'd hire a Freedman-esque lawyer. A Gloria Allred type who would stage press conferences where Lively tearfully recounted how difficult the experience was and would go talk to the dad of the kid who sued Baldoni over copyright or that basketball player who is in litigation with Baldoni over the rights to his life story. But she didn't.

That's an interesting perspective. I don't know anything about Lively's attorneys to know whether your assessments of them is true, but the parallel between Allred and Freedman I can see. I do feel like, in general, Lively has been going for a more traditional approach working with the NY Times (and probably the LA Times) vs social media and tabloids. Although it appears Baldoni is winning social media right now, this may work out for her in the end. The SNL invite suggests she has some currency still (backlash notwithstanding).