Shortly after its release in the summer of 2024, drama surrounding It Ends With Us began to dominate the news cycle. While the book to screen adaptation did well in theaters, the title is now largely associated with ongoing legal drama between director Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds. Newly unearthed audio reveals that Scarlett Johansson was name dropped in the mist of the drama... and surprisingly it wasn't related to her previous relationship with Reynolds.
Blake Lively's lawsuit against Wayfarer Studios started an epic legal saga that's still playing out to this day. Baldoni responded with a defamation case, and both of their legal teams have been hard at work. In audio from the case (via Us Weekly), Wayfarer founder Steve Sarowitz spoke to filmmaker Claire Ayoub about ScarJo's directorial debut Eleanor the Great. Sarowitz joked about her being an "unknown", saying:
We’re trying to give her her first big break. Maybe people will hear of her after this.
Jokes aside, the Wayfarer boss did take his time to compliment Johansson's work on Eleanor the Great. He compared her to working with Lively on It Ends With Us (which is streaming with a Netflix subscription). As he put it:
She was so cool, calm, collected and confident … and nice. It’s so interesting because you work with so many people. Almost everybody is nice, and then there’s Blake — she is totally different than everyone else. Not to say anything bad about her, but she’s different.
While he didn't exactly rag on the Gossip Girl star, there's a big difference from describing Johansson as "nice" and Lively as "different." And it hints at the drama that had been brewing between her and the powers that be at Wayfarer Studios, especially Justin Baldoni.
Steve Sarowitz went on to speak more about the importance off being "nice". In the exec's own words:
I think for the most part most people see what we are doing see we’re nice and they’re nice back. Even if they weren’t perfectly nice. I just think some people forgot to learn how to be nice.
While he didn't name Blake Lively here, he seems to be referencing her as someone who "forgot to learn ho to be nice". This would track, given how much tension was reportedly on the set of It Ends With Us. That includes the movie's star allegedly weighing in on the script, with Ryan Reynolds reportedly rewriting certain scenes. Eventually things reached a boiling point, which is how the current legal saga began. And it's showing no signs of slowing down.
It Ends With Us is streaming now on Netflix, and the legal battle will seemingly continue for the foreseeable future. As for Blake Lively, she's attached to a handful upcoming projects.
