Lively v. Baldoni 40 - No, You See, When He Said He Wanted Her to Collaborate, He Meant... Not That

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:01 Clip: All rise. Court is now in session. Court is reconvened. I may be seated. Maintain order. The federal rise to face the jury and harken to its verdicts.

0:00:26 Thomas: Gavel in, everyone. Reluctantly gavel in. Anyone who's left after hearing the voicemail, anyone who's, yeah, well, I was going to say left over, but yeah, sure, either way. Both, both ways of that word. If you've left, we aren't talking to you, but if you're remaining,

0:00:33 Lydia: We get it. Oh, no, I'm saying anyone who, like, like bailed. Yeah.

0:00:43 Thomas: Oh, okay, I see there's three listeners. Okay, well that's enough. Well, that's a quorum. Him. Oh, I'm Thomas. That's Lydia. How are you doing?

0:00:51 Lydia: Hi, doing pretty well. Had to shake off the ick after that last episode.

0:00:55 Thomas: We also need to lawyer up.

0:00:57 Lydia: Yeah, probably.

0:00:57 Thomas: We're going to see a lot of litigation from playing that voicemail to people. I've, I've yeah, that was a war crime.

0:01:01 Lydia: Their damages are real, too. Like, I don't know. On their side yeah

0:01:05 Thomas: I know what this is. Yeah. They're going to play this in court, but it's, I, you know, I cannot tell a lie. Our defense is not going to be that the voicemmail wasn't damaging. We'll just have to try to say like, Hey, it wasn't us. It was Baldoni. You know, it's like, so, cause we're not going gonna deny that that vocemail caused lots of permanent, permanent, I think, damage to all of us.

0:01:23 Lydia: Yeah on the plus side I think you're like retching noises that you made during the episode like we're really cathartic for a lot of people so that's like the early feedback I've been

0:01:32 Thomas: Yeah, normally people aren't fond of hearing those kinds of sounds, but I feel like when it's in the right place, you know, like really needed to be there. So we're on, I guess, episode 40, I want to say. Cool.

0:01:37 Lydia: Getting yeah yeah that's by my count that's what we're

0:01:48 Thomas: And we've got hours, we've got days, weeks of this complaint to get through. Let's try to do it. Maybe we can go a little faster. We'll see.

0:01:53 Lydia: At oh jesus yeah we'll

0:01:56 Thomas: So after the break, we're going to continue on to debunk lie after lie lie after lie in Justin Baldoni's bullshit complaint. Wayfarer v. Lively. Support the show, patreon.com/gavelpod. There you can skip the ads and get bonus stuff. Sometimes we do bonus stuff, we should find a bonus thing to do. I like to look at like, a good bonus is like, find some insane online takes. That'd be a fun one.

0:02:19 Thomas: You know what, you guys can request stuff if you want.

0:02:18 Lydia: See yeah oh yeah Yeah.

0:02:21 Thomas: Like if you're like, oh, we saw this video. I mean, I know it's a little out of date now. So, but like, if there's anything where, yeah, I don't know. I feel like we do. But if there's, if it was from back at the time, we're like, please take this on. We might consider it patrons. If you're a patron, patreon .com slash gavel pod. All right. After this break, we'll get into it.

0:02:27 Lydia: Well, it's bonus. I mean, we don't have to go timeline order for bonuses.

0:02:50 Ad: [Ad break 1 — ad music]

0:02:51 Thomas: Okay. Is this complaint like, is this better than having to listen to the voicemail? I don't even know. It's close.

0:02:56 Lydia: I don't know. I means, we get to do it in our voices, and so I think that's good. Okay. Hey, complaint.

0:02:59 Thomas: Yeah, that's fair. Oh no. I'm going to be doing it in Justin's voice. Hey gavel gavel uh oh oh okay

0:03:07 Lydia: God, it sucks. Okay. I just have to get this off my chest. It sucks so bad because, again, I was team Raphael for Jane the Virgin. I found him so so attractive, loved his voice. Like it kills me. It kills me to like have to be on this side, but I, it's just, I don't know. I it's no, I have to, because he did some crappy stuff.

0:03:27 Thomas: I mean you know no one's making you I guess you don't have to yeah no I I could not imagine liking this person after all we know about him but that's just me

0:03:33 Lydia: And so I know, but it just, it makes me sad. Cause like, I just like, I don'T know, like his voice did not bother me when I found him attractive. And now that we're on this side now it's like making fun of it and stuff I don't know it's just like what a weird journey yeah yeah

0:03:49 Thomas: Well I don't know that it bothers would bother me in all contexts it's just that voicemail it's just like that thing he did all right we can we can't we gotta go but um I gave you your time yeah Yeah. Where were we in this stupid shit?

0:03:55 Lydia: Anyway yeah I had to get it off my chest thank you thank you okay I think we're at paragraph 43 is where we left off because we just got

0:04:03 Thomas: Sure. Are you sure it wasn't 430? Maybe it was 430. Skip down. Yeah.

0:04:07 Lydia: Through wow this went by so fast so we just we went through the whole Khaleesi mess the voice memo and now we are getting into into some more of like what was happening during still pre -production stuff, but involving other people. So I think we just got to start chatting about some of this. I'm going to start by reading paragraph 43. All right. Difficult. Proved to be a gross understatement. Though Baldoni initially invited Lively to make changes to the script, Lively began altering the script daily. The frequency of Lively's revisions alarmed the producers, director and studio, not to mention and that the director and studio and one of the producers, like those are a lot of the same people.

0:04:48 Thomas: That's everybody. Yeah. That's all them. Producers, director, and studio. I mean, they could be talking about Sony, but they might not be. They might just be talking about them. The secretaries, the treasurers. Yeah. All the shareholders. God, everybody. Bookkeepers. Troopers.

0:04:55 Lydia: Yeah, I feel like they're not. I think they're just talking about Wayfarer. So it alarmed Jamie, Justin, Steve, and also Alex Axe, the one person who's not part of Wayfarers, who anticipated that her interference would persist, quote, every day of the shoot and disrupt the carefully planned production schedule. Each shooting day was intricately scheduled long in advance and lively's constant changes place significant stress on the production crew not to mention financial strain on wayfarer

0:05:27 Thomas: And then we get, we get a little snippet here that I swear is just not like, we can't make sense of it. Whoever's writing this is just either completely lying or retconning because he just did nothing but encourage Blake Lively to contribute. And dann we have this like little thing that I don't know if we read where she invites him on a plane ride to work on the the script. And that's April 28th, 2023. Then April 30th, 2023, they returned together to New York. Now, how many days has April? 30?

0:06:01 Thomas: So the next day, we're to believe that this exchange is about Blake sucking?

0:06:01 Lydia: Yeah well like this idea lively begins altering the script daily on may 1st but that was also a working flight from from what they've presented too so it's not just lively altering the script daily like baldoni's participating in that yeah

0:06:14 Thomas: Yeah. Well, that's what I'm saying. There isn't, between, if they flew together and returned on April 30, there isn't the time to say she's doing this daily. Like, how would she be? Yeah.

0:06:28 Lydia: Well yeah yeah exactly I think that that's completely disingenuous the way that they've represented it there and and And all I can think of is that this is, you know, some sort of production meeting, pre -production meeting or whatever. And maybe Justin has shared, like, Blake offered these revisions and this is the reaction. Yeah.

0:06:45 Thomas: So let's read this because I don't think we did. But producer, are you listening to this? She's fixing the script. I think blank advice was actually wrong. So that sounds positive. You know what I mean? Like she's fixing. The script could mean Blake. Maybe we don't know. We know that the redacted there's I think redact ed advice was was actually wrong. We don't know if that's about the movie or if that is about the next sentence which is Blake is now directing the movie. This is bad. So that seems negative. But we don't like the thing with text is we don' t know which pronouns are referring to what and what was like a thought that was related to another thing. Like it's just the flow doesn't make sense of this.

0:07:21 Lydia: Yeah. Are you listening to this? We don't know exactly what that text is in response to, like what was said at that particular moment in whatever that meeting was. So, yeah, there's a lot missing here.

0:07:31 Thomas: And then Jamie Heath says I'm listening. Talking through it is better than not. Seeing what's possible is like a separate sentence fragment there. As long as any decision is done done with approval, which, yeah, that seems fine. Why not?

0:07:43 Lydia: Yeah.

0:07:43 Thomas: And then producer says not for something that was already intimately planned. This will be every day of the shoot. Jamie, he says, I know I'm not sure what can be done, honestly, at this point in terms of Blake. I can't make heads or tails of that.

0:07:57 Lydia: I think this concern that, you Know, she's getting involved and it's going to disrupt the shoot. Like draft revisions happen constantly over the course of like being in production even like I don't think that they haven't even started filming right this is weeks before filming has started

0:08:08 Thomas: Yeah. They haven't started filming yet. I don't know what's what this is referring to. Like, I really don't. Is this just like a production meeting? And is she suggesting some sort of change that's going to impact like just the whole film or something.

0:08:25 Lydia: Now yeah something incredibly significant she's adding new characters like I have no idea that seems a little ridiculous based off of everything else we

0:08:33 Thomas: I don't know. I feel like this is so unclear that it doesn't really prove it. Like, I feel Like if this was really happening, they would have better text than this. Because right now, based on everything we're seeing, where Baldoni just says that he hated her contributions and or whatever, and it was, but really, what he's texting her is fuck, yes, awesome, great. I literally wanted to write this with you. I can't even do the character without you is what he is telling her.

0:08:43 Lydia: Know yeah yeah

0:08:58 Thomas: And then we're to believe now he hated it I think that that's bullshit retconned and I think they're trying to piece anything together they can to support that theory and this is the best I can do but it's like nothing it's so unclear I

0:08:58 Lydia: Yeah and you know what's so funny too is like here's another way that you can interpret this Like, you know, I think Blank's advice was actually wrong. Blake is now directing the movie. This is bad. That, to some extent, could be the producer being like, Justin needs to step up. He's dropping the ball here and texting it to Jamie. And we think this is Alex Sachs, right? This producer reaching out to Jamie saying, hey, your boy is not directing the movie now anymore because of the lead he's giving Blake. Do you hear this? This is Bad. Jamie, get him under control. Role encourage him to stand up for what he, you know, really thinks and stuff, because obviously he's not, at least from her perspective at that point.

0:09:49 Thomas: Guess yeah and I just don't know

0:09:51 Lydia: I mean, I think that would be kind of like a reasonable way to take this.

0:09:54 Thomas: Especially because it said she's fixing the script it's weird to be like she's fix the script anyway that sucks you know

0:09:58 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's so weird. Like maybe that's a word that was used leading up to this text, like on the whatever pre -production thing that was going on where fixing this or whatever. And she forgot to quotes. I don't know. We're having to speculate so much.

0:10:10 Thomas: Yeah I don't know all right we it's just unclear yeah I just my point is this is very unclear and I feel like there would be way better evidence if this were true I think it's just not true and then what I think is funny too is uh we get the next thing in the in the exhibit is May 3rd Lively and Baldoni text almost daily and we're comfortable making silly jokes so at the same time he's trying to retcon like oh my god she's taking over it's horrible it's the worst he realizes he also has to retcon or maybe it's not really a retcon but he also Has to emphasize that she actually liked him the whole time you know because it's like countering things because for the sexual harassment thing, his defense is going to be like, oh, we just have this relationship and we're comfortable making jokes kind of thing. And so I think it's funny that on one hand, he has to be building this fake storyline, I think, of she was stealing everything and we hated it. And then at the same time, still has to bolster this idea that they had this great relationship. And it's like, that's weird.

0:11:05 Thomas: That seemed like if you had that great relationship, why are you not just communicating like, hey, don't take over the movie? I think that's because he didn't feel that way at the time. I think all the evidence is that.

0:11:14 Lydia: That's a good point. Now, notably, the Writers Guild of America went on strike the day after that producer text being like May

0:11:21 Thomas: Was that May 2nd, you're saying?

0:11:23 Lydia: 2nd. Yeah. And so they basically had to put a pause on any official writing capacity, at least.

0:11:29 Thomas: Okay. Interesting. Then for some reason, the complaint goes to more than a year later. This is where she did the interview. I think we've covered this, so we'll skip through this. She did the overview. She kind of accidentally said, in my opinion, based on the evidence, that Ryan Reynolds wrote this scene, which I think she meant he contributed a line or two that they improvised. Then we know, we kind of fast forwarded when we covered this that Blake wrote a really nice apology like that night or the next day or something that wasn't publicized it wasn't for anybody other than the person she was apologizing to which is the writer and this strikes me as them trying to once again make a huge thing out of something that wouldn't if there weren't any tension around this no one would think twice about this it's just one of those like off-handed comments that when you're going through every single word trying to find a way that this person is the worst this is just nothing like it's nothing and I love it too this reminds me so much of the thing with andrew where like any little thing like this they have have to go off as though it's this like horrible unlawful thing and write from that perspective like they write from the perspective of like and then we caught her stealing the money out of the safe and

0:12:35 Thomas: Then it's like they write from that so like this startling revelation directly contradicted lively's previous insistence that she had written the scene and then this other language here this was also the first time that wayfarer parties learned that reynolds who had no formal role whatsoever in the film's production had made unauthorized changes to the script in secret secret.

0:12:54 Thomas: How could you make, you literally can't, you can't make unauthorized changes to a script in secret. Like that's not a thing you, like if they're shooting and me over here in my room, I make like some changes to the script that doesn't actually work unless they change the script. Yeah.

0:12:53 Lydia: Printed and handed out to the actors and

0:13:10 Thomas: Unless they think Reynolds did some sort of magic spell or something like it's just stupid.

0:13:15 Lydia: Yeah like the closest thing to that would be like improvisation is an unauthorized change to the script but it's authorized in that you keep it or you don't like the director makes that decision like oh hey that was funny that worked now something that wasn't necessarily in the script before is now authorized it's the exact exact same

0:13:32 Thomas: Yeah, and I want to highlight this because we've given the two theories and just to remind mind you, what we have is unambiguous evidence of Baldoni and it's not even his own words. So Baldoni saying that he's thinking one thing and saying another, because we have the complaint saying, oh, I was so, I hated, I Was scared for my life.

0:13:50 Thomas: And then the exhibit, the actual text will say like, fuck yes, this is awesome. I am not scared for My Life. And either he was lying to everyone's face, which in some cases might make sense. Like for sure, I'm going to have sympathy if someone's like not wanting to say an uncomfortable thing, like totally, I would have have sympathy for that. But based on him being the director and all the wealth of evidence around this, this is way more consistent with him just trying to retcon something that didn't exist. Like he's trying to retroactively say something that doesn't exist is listen to this Baldoni equally blindsided by this news, which he discovered in real time during a recorded interview with access Hollywood reacted by also praising Reynolds. So as

0:13:50 Lydia: Thing yeah yeah

0:14:25 Thomas: Not to harm lively comma Reynolds. And then it gives a parenthetical who apparently wrote the scene and possibly others during the wga strike or the film so yeah so yes he said oh great awesome love ryan reynolds but of course he was in secret the whole time you know it's like every time he's this character that's the spy that we're supposed to be like oh yeah he was saying that but what he was thinking was he hated all this all the time it's just pathetic it's not real and again think of how much they would just torch blake if she did that there's not really many places in her complaint I I can't even remember any right now where she says, yes, I, you know, said I loved it, but actually I hated it. And then we have text evidence of her being like, I love this, you know, like they would absolutely destroy her for that.

0:14:47 Lydia: Yeah it's crazy oh yeah they would it'd be the only thing they talk about on reddit for weeks

0:15:12 Thomas: Instead, what we have is consistently her saying, I was uncomfortable with this. I was comfortable with this here's contemporaneous evidence saying I was uncomfortable with us. I was on camera with this and then they just say, nah, she wasn't. That's all they do.

0:15:22 Lydia: Yeah I do want to read paragraph 45 because the comments that she made did raise some alarm bells for sony yeah lively's remarks about reynolds purported contribution to the script raised eyebrows sky high at sony who told wayfarer that they quote certainly needed some clarity on public comments made about ryan reynold's potentially contributing writing services for the rooftop scene. And again, from Sony, it's like a liability issue. It's, you know, they're thinking on like the side of any issues that they might have with the union because of this. They don't know.

0:15:30 Thomas: Sony. Yeah.

0:15:54 Lydia: They're not involved in the day to day stuff here. So they hear Blake Lively's comments on the red carpet, which did sound like it was more significant contributions than it probably actually was. Yeah.

0:15:53 Thomas: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. She put her foot in her mouth. She said the wrong thing for sure or

0:16:06 Lydia: And so Sony's like, hey, we need some clarification on on Ryan Reynolds officially working on this film, in what capacity. If so, we need signed contracts.

0:16:16 Thomas: Just documentation. At least it says and I imagine that was pretty simple to be like uh yeah we nothing we misspoke so that was fast forwarding for some reason I guess just to try to make that fake point and then now we're back

0:16:30 Lydia: Just about Blake Lively, the writer, I guess, is what they're trying to get at.

0:16:32 Thomas: Yeah and Ryan Reynolds yeah 46 we're going back to pre -production and we're gonna talk about the fat shaming allegation this seems to be like a significant section here so here's something that's interesting I was just looking things through and I noticed that for some reason we jumped backwards in the timeline seems kind of weird and I think it's because when you look at what this is so we're going to be talking about the fat shaming allegations here for a minute and these happened before the last thing with the flight and the writing together and I Think they wanted to not like I think it would have undermined it if they were like and then there's this fat shaman thing anyway Anyway, so we still, we're in the flight together and we, yeah, we just got along so well.

0:17:17 Lydia: And they still got along.

0:17:19 Thomas: I really think that's intentional so that they can be like, they were getting along. Now let's put in this like really bad conflict and not have it undermined.

0:17:22 Lydia: Yeah, 100%. Yeah, it's very manipulative. Yeah.

0:17:29 Thomas: So I really Think that's why they moved. Otherwise it makes no sense because we just moved backwards for no reason.

0:17:34 Lydia: No, exactly, from a storytelling perspective, it makes no sense. Logically, it is. It's all for manipulation. Yeah.

0:17:42 Thomas: So we've gone through this. I think we can quickly try to try to, yeah. Like I'm trying to decide, cause it's hard to not just go all the way into it. Like if people don't remember then I don't want to like haphazardly do it but then again we've already done this if you want to hear our full thoughts on the this particular thing go back to the New York Times one which is where he first made this defense and I think we talked all about it but we'll quickly just say the points so Baldoni says he was introduced to this trainer Don by Blake Lively so keep in mind that to begin with and he says that Don is like his personal trainer. You know, he's just like, he just says it like he's helping him for the film role. And we get a couple of messages from February saying like, Hey, give me a, you gotta, gotta work program for me. And then we get like one workout. Okay. For something.

0:18:30 Thomas: And Then that's February. So now April 22nd, Baldoni says he privately reached out to Don, his personal trainer to ask what lively weighed so that he could train his back muscles in preparation for a lift scene. This was important to avoid injury, not only to Baldoni who suffered from lifelong back injuries, multiple bulging discs and chronic pain but also to lively if the lift could not be completed successfully and safely I yeah we already talked about this lively said there is no lift scene I don't know what it would be yeah

0:18:54 Lydia: Find this so irritating. Yeah. Yeah, Baldoni's position is that there's no lift scene because she wouldn't allow there to be a lift scene.

0:19:05 Thomas: So he says there wasn't a lift scene in the movie because like and I will confess something that the way that thing is presented just in my experience reading a bunch of things where people are lying I actually feel like it's possible they're telling the truth somehow about that. Like he says there was a lift scene. She says there was no lift scene in the film.

0:19:25 Thomas: And then he says, well, yeah, it wasn't in the film because you nixed it.

0:19:29 Lydia: I believe it.

0:19:30 Thomas: Yeah. Like maybe it was, but here's the thing. There's just no way, like we went all through this. There's no way the marginal difference in Blake's weight is going to make a difference. Like whatever this is, first off, you don't literally do everything in a movie that is portrayed. There are angles and whatever to make it seem like something's happening or there's a million ways to do something. And I just don't like the the marginal difference in weight in terms of your training, I don't buy that.

0:19:31 Lydia: I actually believe that. Yeah

0:19:54 Thomas: And combined with what you've found that Trainer Don said.

0:19:54 Lydia: Yeah so Don edited one of his posts I think it was on Instagram that he originally published before basically like as this was all coming out he wrote to be clear Here, Justin Baldoni is not my client. I created a complimentary program for him as a favor to a client. I have never trained him virtually or in person. I never met him in person, we communicated via calls and texts from January to March, 2023. I could not accommodate his schedule and found him a coach. After an uncomfortable conversation, communication ended. And then not only is Blake my client, she's also my very dear friend.

0:20:31 Lydia: She's treated me with unmatched kindness for over 15 years. Fair weather friends are not friends. Yeah.

0:20:36 Thomas: Wow. Wow. So it's interesting that he says March because this is Baldoni saying April 22nd, which means this is the uncomfortable conversation.

0:20:45 Lydia: This is the uncomfortable conversation. And they were not chatting in a personal trainer client. If Dawn's, you know, recollection is to be believed here, that relationship was no longer happening.

0:20:54 Thomas: I don'T know about the lift scene thing, like, because who knows what the truth of whatever that lift scene is. Maybe they, maybe Baldoni has something that they're going to be able to like say without without technically lying that was going to be a lift scene maybe I don't know one way or the other what I know for a fact is this never made any sense to me that is baldoni story for a million reasons one of which is if this were what he was saying why would don freak out and tell blake lively knowing how sensitive women might be about their weight if this was genuinely baldoni being like hey I know this is weird but I just I just want to make sure that I can do this lift um You mind telling me like kind of how much she weighs just so I can like just, you know, keep it on the down low. But like I'm just trying to make sure I'm going to be able to do it. I can't imagine this trainer wanting to like proactively create a whole thing about that and end and end whatever this relationship was. Even though it wasn't like a client one, it seemed like they were friendly or something or at least like we're communicating.

0:21:47 Lydia: Yeah, professional.

0:21:54 Thomas: Yeah. So what that tells me, all this put together, which is that it doesn't make sense. You wouldn't actually have to lift her if your back is hurting. And if you do have a back injury and you are thinking of lifting her, the marginal five to 10 pounds that someone could even like lose or anything like that's not going to make a difference. Here's my point. If you're really concerned about your back, you can guess her weight within a reasonable amount. That's not gonna make a different, you're not gonna be like, I guessed 144 and she was 148 and then I just fell over, just fucking died. It's stupid.

0:22:22 Lydia: Again, like, why? Why is this so important? He like reiterates it in the complaint to he says this scene was important to him as a storyteller and director. Like we're talking about a freaking lift that you physically probably shouldn't even even be doing I know

0:22:36 Thomas: Well, yeah, I'll help you with that. It's because he's lying. So he's trying. Yeah, no, no. I know. No. So that's, that's the point taken is that he, so your point being that he has to do some flourishes on this whole thing to make it justified in retrospect, but

0:22:39 Lydia: I know but it's just it's so crazy to me like what are we talking about yeah like this scene was so incredibly important to to like the art of the film and it's just like god jack off

0:22:54 Thomas: The, yeah. But if Don is categorically saying, sorry, I never want to interrupt a jack up much. I have apologies. Should not have talked. If Don is saying I wasn't his personal trainer, which I feel like is pretty solid evidence that he wasn't his personal trainer, you know, like, yeah, like it would be a fucking weird thing for Don to do. Why the fuck would Baldoni be asking Don other than

0:23:00 Lydia: Motion he also was not credited as his trainer in the film either yeah yeah

0:23:21 Thomas: Baldoni knows that Don is Blake's personal trainer. At least it works with Blake. Like that's how he got the referral. Right.

0:23:25 Lydia: Yep yep I think he is credited as her trainer in in the film too so like 100 he is her trainer

0:23:30 Thomas: So now I guess in fairness, he's saying like, well, he is asking for the info to then maybe we would assume that he's going to take that to his real actual trainer. I mean, not really. Cause he says Baldoni reached out to Don, his personal trainer. So yeah, he's just lying about that. So this tells me that I really think what happened was Baldoni was worried about her weight for appearance reasons. And I guess he got a little unlucky slash also as an asshole that he asked somebody, you know, it's like if you ever accidentally shit talk to someone, like when it turns out the person you're shit talking to is like better friends with the person who you're a shit talking. I'm sure you don't have experience with this because you're nice.

0:24:08 Thomas: Now it's like, oh shit, bad luck. Cause then like right away they get told it. I think that's what happened.

0:24:14 Lydia: I don't know I've been in that position before you get caught up in the gossip machine and yeah yeah

0:24:18 Thomas: Exactly. Yeah. It's like I think that's happened here. It makes way more sense with all the data together. Like there's just no reason if this were all above board that this personal trainer would want to like really do something unpleasant with Blake Lively. He'd just be like, yeah, man. Okay. Even if he wasn't going to tell him, he could have been like, hey, I'm not comfortable telling you that it's my client. End of conversation. If this weren't a big deal and if it were all above board, I can't imagine this trainer. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'm just saying taking the weight of the evidence together, like the odds seem to me overwhelming that Baldoni was shitty in this conversation. And that explains why Blake would find out about like instantly, and this would cause a rift.

0:24:36 Lydia: Ja

0:24:57 Thomas: So speaking of the rift, now we get, and it's just so interesting, April 25th, which is again, before they're riding together on the plane and before he himself says how great they get along. April 25th, why don't you read 49, I guess.

0:24:56 Lydia: Ja ja mm -hmm lively summoned baldoni to her penthouse purportedly to discuss the script however he was met by an angry Reynolds not Reynolds just like their butler or something like it's named reynolds who screamed at baldoni and accused him of fat shaming his wife and then parenthetically and in quotes how dare you fucking ask about my wife's weight what's wrong with you the confrontation by Reynolds and Lively was so aggressive that baldoni felt he had no choice but to offer repeated and completely unwarranted apologies for what was a good faith and reasonable question to ask of his

0:25:20 Thomas: And which one? Yeah, Burt Reynolds. Yeah, yeah. Once again, oh, I can't, once again, gosh,

0:25:51 Lydia: Trainer was not his trainer.

0:25:52 Thomas: This poor Baldoni, he keeps getting in a position where he has to say one thing, but all along he was actually thinking the direct opposite thing. Wow, so man, tough break. Break. Another tough break for our poor Baldoni. When will he stand up for himself? You know, little guy. Yeah.

0:26:07 Lydia: Reynolds demanded Baldoni remove the scene entirely. Lively refused to perform the lift scene in the end, even after it was rehearsed with a stunt double. In her own complaint, Lively flat out lies about the absence of this scene by claiming, quote, the scene wasn't in the film. It's not a flat out lie because it wasn't. The only reason the scene was not in the movie is because Lively and Reynolds ensured it was taken out of the movie.

0:26:25 Thomas: That's a small thing, but like, yeah, that's not a flat out lie. You would say like Lively lies by omission or like, you know, like at least be, it's always the most hyperbole with them. Like just be like, and Lively very deceptively says the scene wasn't in the film. Well, yeah.

0:26:38 Lydia: When in reality, yeah, exactly. Exactly.

0:26:44 Thomas: It wasn't the film because yeah. Flat out lies.

0:26:47 Lydia: Yeah. Accommodating Lively, Baldoni rewrote the scene with Lively despite the fact that for creative reasons, the scene was important to him as a storyteller and director.

0:26:56 Thomas: Man. And there he is rewriting all the scenes and not credit it as a writer, but I don't know, I guess. If this is true, which I feel like in broad strokes, it would be tough to make this up. If Ryan Reynolds was yelling at him or at least confronting him, the amount of certainty that a husband would have to have, especially, sorry, I shouldn't say a husband, that Ryan Reynolds, who works in the industry and has connections and relationships and is not going to just like, he's not some random husband that heard like, wait, you said something about my wife. Like this is a guy who works in this industry. The amount of certainty that he would have to have to do this kind of confrontation in my mind would probably be pretty high. And that is further corroboration, at least in all likelihood of what my theory is, is that Baldoni said a shitty thing about her weight to her personal trainer. And the trainer was like, wow, get this. And then Reynolds was like holy fucking shit because they have a actual relationship with that trainer and are friends with him.

0:27:51 Thomas: And the trailer said, I'm not Baldoni's trainer. I mean, it couldn't be more clear. Like the The internet, every single thing is a sign that Blake's lying. But when it's just in black and white, like actually he's lying, they're like, eh, doesn't matter.

0:28:03 Lydia: Yeah I know they'll just gloss right over that.

0:28:12 Ad: [Ad break 2 — ad music]

0:28:12 Thomas: So if I look at the timeline, they actually give what they say is the scene. And I forgot about this. So there's a little bit of the script here. It's not what ends up in the movie, but that's, you know, I guess if Justin's story, to give this a full fair look, if Justin story is correct, then this had to be changed to not do a lift.

0:28:31 Lydia: Keep in mind though that his position is the scene wasn't in the film because they ensured it was taken out of the film. What we're talking about is blocking within a scene.

0:28:41 Thomas: He said he had to rewrite it. And the dialogue in this paragraph is slightly different than what's in the movie. So I'm going to give that a fair hearing. But OK, so here's what he offers in his timeline. We just get Ryle. Fuck the hand, Lily. I don't care about my hand. Are you OK? He looks back and forth between her eyes, assessing the cut on her face. I don'T know. I think Lily says, Ryle, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me. He presses his mouth to Lily's and breathes her in. Lily is so upset she starts to kiss him back in need of comfort until Ryle scoops her up gently laying her down on the floor he kisses her wound a mix of blood and tears now close on Lily closing her eyes accepting his apologies so viscerally by the time she opens them again it's clear she's convinced herself of one thing Lily says it was an accident so I'm trying to give this full fairness so like I there's no way this was a lift

0:28:46 Lydia: A little bit. Mm-hmm yeah

0:29:35 Thomas: Like I'm like okay so this scene is in the kitchen. They are having a fine old time flirting and maybe going to engage in some sort of sexy times when, wouldn't you know it, the oven starts beeping and instantly smoking. Like that's the fire beep, I think. I don't, like right away, I guess, right away it's already, it's like burning. And she's like, oh crap. And he's like I gotta get. So he tries to open the oven. And if you haven't watched the movie, like the central thing they do, which apparently is is not in the book is they have all these moments of abuse that when you see it the first time you see it through Blake's or Lily's revisionist history of it, which I think is actually a good part of the movie. I think that's like the most interesting. Yeah, I think it's the most interesting part of The Movie. And so we're seeing like her version, but it turns out later, spoilers, sorry, that it's like, the real version was like, he just flat out hit her intentionally.

0:29:51 Lydia: Smoke detector beep lily yeah oh I think it's such a smart storytelling device yeah yeah

0:30:27 Thomas: But in this revised history version, that is the first one we see, he goes to like, like try to lift the thing without getting the oven mitt or potholder and he burns his hand and then like in reaction hits her. And then because of that, I think he did drop the dish and it shatters on the floor.

0:30:45 Thomas: So there's glass all over the floor, keep in mind. So in the movie version, after he hit her, she's kind of like crouching on the door. And he kind of goes down to her and is like, are you okay? And then that's when we get, oh, and then as she's getting up, She's like confused. She pushes him off her a little bit and he falls back and his hand goes into the glass that was broken, which I actually I like that, too. I actually think that's a really good storytelling, too, because it's part of that thing where often in abusive relationships you can point to like, oh, well, she also did this.

0:30:53 Lydia: Mm -hum

0:31:19 Thomas: But it's usually defensive stuff almost always. And like, I don't know, I thought that was an interesting detail. That's why she says about his hand, because he's also a surgeon and he has the very important surgery tomorrow so at this point they're what oh

0:31:19 Lydia: Yeah mm yeah yeah like dr strange dr strange he ended up ruining his hand and wasn't able to be like he had the steadiest hands of

0:31:38 Thomas: God how do you remember that I was like what the fuck are you talking about no you're right yeah and then he turns into like a time lord or whatever yeah sure yeah yeah doctor first

0:31:39 Lydia: All that's why you're so confused yeah

0:31:51 Thomas: So in the way it's shot now they're

0:31:58 Lydia: And he becomes a superhero because that's everybody's backup job so yeah or some amount of improvisation you

0:32:04 Thomas: Standing up and he says let me see it and it it's there's a lot of lines that weren't that weren'T in the script so I don't know if that's the rewrite here's my point if we are to

0:32:18 Lydia: Know like in the moment from a standing position

0:32:20 Thomas: Believe this is a lift either the way it was meant to be was he hits her and she's standing up still and they start to do like that kiss thing it describes and he scoops her up as in like picks her up but then it says gently laying her down on the floor when there's glass

0:32:23 Lydia: Covered with glass exactly that that jumped out at me too

0:32:26 Thomas: Everywhere so that doesn't make sense plus just think about how weird that would be like you pick her up and lay her on the floor that's the only way it could be a lift and that's insane what I think it's describing is they're both on the floor because she fell on the floor after the hit and they're like doing the comforting there and he kind of scoops her up means like you know embraces her

0:32:47 Lydia: Into his arms kind of thing

0:32:47 Thomas: Or like right don't you think yeah like scoops her up that could be absent any context I guess I could believe that's lifting but it also could read as like embracing her and that kind kind of thing. And gently laying her down on the floor is the thing where that has to be like, they're already most of the way there. Otherwise that's crazy.

0:33:05 Lydia: The only other thing I could think of is that something was not written here in the block what would be in the blocking which is that he scoops her up and moves to another room to lay her down on the floor to like get out of the way of the glass

0:33:17 Thomas: Why on the floor? Why wouldn't it be on a bed?

0:33:19 Lydia: I don't know, couch. Yeah, yeah. I don't know. I don't know.

0:33:20 Thomas: I, yeah, that's what I'm saying. I don't, I think that's not right. I think this is him trying to find any place to justify it. And he found scoops her up.

0:33:27 Lydia: Well he is talking about something real there is something that they were planning on doing that he felt like he wasn't able to do like he's not making up that entire thing right they both agree that there was a lift that he was concerned about and that's why he asked about her weight

0:33:41 Thomas: No, they don't. They don't both agree. She says there was no lift. His story is she just says there wasn't a scene from her position. He made this up to try to justify this lie when really he was just asking how much does she weigh? Cause he wants her to lose weight for the movie, not for a lift. So from her allegation, we were to believe, and maybe this is important to say, because if she was lying about this, it would be pretty messed up. From her allegation. I'm pretty sure we are meant to believe he was just asking, has she lost enough weight for essentially we're going to film soon. She can't be overweight. Then his version was no, there's a lift scene. And then she responded with, there is no lift scene that doesn't make any sense.

0:33:44 Lydia: Well she agrees that he said there was and that's why he asks don about her wait

0:34:20 Thomas: And then he says, oh no, it's this part in the script. So she doesn't acknowledge a lift scene.

0:34:24 Lydia: Okay you' re right so she She is sharing what was from her memory shared by Baldoni to the trainer. She says this is paragraph 65 of her original complaint filed 12 -31 -24. Mr. Baldoni told the trainer that he had asked because he was concerned about having to pick Miss Lively up in a scene for the movie, but there was no such scene.

0:34:43 Thomas: Wait, did he tell the trainer that?

0:34:44 Lydia: Yes. Mr.

0:34:45 Thomas: Can you read that again? Sorry.

0:34:46 Lydia: Baldoni told the trainer that he asked because of her memory. Mr. Baldoni told the trainer that he was worried about having to pick Miss Lively up in the scene for her memory, but no such thing. That's his excuse for asking about her weight.

0:34:55 Thomas: Just to get that very very clear. If you're saying Mr. Baldoni told the trainer that he had asked because of a lift scene, that reads to me like, he's like, hey, I don't know if she should weigh. And then the trainer's like, I'm sorry, what? Or something. You know what I mean?

0:35:08 Lydia: Mm hmm.

0:35:08 Thomas: Like, I mean, who knows if that's just how she wrote it. Maybe I'm wrong. I had made the assumption that she was saying that was a post hoc like excuse or whatever.

0:35:16 Lydia: No, I think the post hoc excuse is in this footnote 10 that she includes in later text messages sent to his team. Mr. Baldoni referred to Miss Lively's trainer as a damn spy. We talked about that and sought to plant stories to portray his concerns as being motivated by his lower back pain.

0:35:25 Thomas: So that all together is why it went down in my mind as that was a bullshit excuse after he did the accidental thing where the trainer turns out he was closer with Blake than maybe, than maybe Baldoni thought. So I guess the point I'm making is, and tell me if you disagree, I'm imagining that he's asking the trainer, maybe he's not saying like, oh, she's too fat, but he's asking her like, hey, what's, what'S her weight? Then either in a later conversation or in that conversation, if the trainer pushes back, that's when he justifies it like that.

0:35:41 Lydia: Baldoni expected. Yeah. Yeah, I think I agree with that.

0:36:00 Thomas: The other reason I thought that was, I still think that if he had presented it in this way, I find it doubtful that the trainer would have taken such offense to it. I think for the trainer to take such offense to it. And again, there's just, I'm going with probabilities as always. I'm not saying this is the only interpretation. In my mind, the most likely interpretation is the trainer would only make a big deal about this and like risk jeopardizing relationships and stuff. If the way Baldoni asked sucked.

0:36:24 Thomas: That's why I always interpreted this as like Baldoni after the fact, either in the same conversation or maybe later said, Hey, no, it was just because of this lift scene.

0:36:30 Lydia: Yeah, and remember, you know, that they are close, Dawn and Blake, and within her complaint, part of the sentence prior, it says, and implied that he wanted her to lose weight in two weeks. So, yeah. So I think, yeah, yeah。 So I, I, so I think it's right that his excuse at the time, probably after Dawn was like, what? Was like, oh, no, no. No, there's a lift. There's a left.

0:36:39 Thomas: Right? There you go. That I knew there was something that made me think that. Yeah. Or after this confrontation.

0:36:52 Thomas: Yeah, it could even be after Ryan Reynolds yells at him or whatever. He texts Don, hey, what the fuck?

0:36:56 Lydia: Yeah, it could be.

0:36:57 Thomas: And then it's just like, well, I just, the lift scene, you know, like that's what made more sense to me. I find it unlikely that this trainer would have taken such offense to go tell Blake if it were presented in this totally fine way that was like, oh no, it's my back lift scene. You know, I don't think he would have made a big deal about it. So point of all that was Blake has never acknowledged a lift scene now. I read scoops her up as that doesn't necessarily mean lifting. And that was before I think we had watched the movie.

0:37:22 Thomas: Now that I've seen the movie, I cannot make heads or tails of how you would have a lift scene in this scene, in this way, laying her down on the floor. That's so silly.

0:37:31 Lydia: If he were concerned if he thought like this like BS and that complaint saying like oh you know it really affected his vision of the storytelling here it's like what are you talking about like it barely affects it I think that that that scene is perfectly compelling the way that it was done

0:37:39 Thomas: Yeah. It barely affects anything. Yeah, that's a good scene, actually. I thought it was effective.

0:37:47 Lydia: As you were playing it and I was hearing the audio just as we were preparing for this I was getting feelings and stuff and anxiety and goosebumps like I was having a reaction to just the audio of it. It.

0:37:57 Thomas: I think it's a Good Scene.

0:37:59 Lydia: So if Baldoni's worried about the storytelling, you did fine, dude.

0:38:01 Thomas: Yeah or Blake did. Who knows?

0:38:04 Lydia: Yeah, exactly. Or it was cut very well and edited

0:38:07 Thomas: This is entirely me just bullshitting here but maybe blake saw hey you wrote in here that you're gonna lay me down on the floor and then we're gonna finish the scene where I say it was an accident and apparently I'm on the door like is this am I just doing

0:38:14 Lydia: On the glass. Being stabbed all over my body? Yeah.

0:38:22 Thomas: Am I or or even if it's in another room like am I doing that scene from the floor that feels weird you know like I'm just making that up but like I can't imagine that meaning a lift I think it means they're still on the four and he kind of is like in a sense of like oh he's still dizzy kind of thing like like how like laying her down to be more stable on the floor is kind of how I read it.

0:38:40 Thomas: But yeah, I think it's hard to imagine how this would have been a lift. And if it was a lift, there's a bajillion and one ways to film it that wouldn't involve actually bearing someone's entire weight. All right. Well, I Think we dealt with that one. All Right. What's next?

0:38:56 Lydia: Well, so we're not done with the fast shaming though. In fact, paragraph 50.

0:38:58 Thomas: Oh, yeah. Right. We didn't do that. Okay.

0:39:01 Lydia: Yeah lively had earlier expressed insecurity about her postpartum figure and Baldoni made every attempt to genuinely reassure her in this exchange he stated as her director that quote anything you feel insecure about we will talk through and get creative together and make you comfortable I just don't want you to stress about your body it's the last thing you need when he later tried to do just that lively responded with allegations of sexual harassment followed by a lawsuit dramatics

0:39:24 Thomas: Okay, sure. That doesn't make any sense. I think we can kind of skip this. I Think that if Blake's telling the the truth, this just makes Justin look even more shitty. And I think we already have that view. Like if she's telling the truth he fucking sucks. None of this is inconsistent with what Blake's saying. So there's not really any point in hashing it out because like all of these texts are from February. So months before. Now it's entirely possible I could conceive of it either way. Like if Blake were lying, yeah, that would suck. There's no evidence in here that she is. So there's no point in reading it. But if Baldoni is lying, this is entirely consistent with someone who is like, oh, hey, yeah. You got a couple months. You're training your ass off. That's what the texts are she's like hey I I understand my job here I want to make sure my body looks good essentially and she and in february she's acknowledging that and what could have happened was baldoni sees her and because of his standards is thinking oh shit she didn't lose enough weight at this later point and that's why he's asking the trainer so like these texts

0:40:19 Thomas: I'm saying are they don't do anything because they're entirely compatible with maybe he was totally nice via text and maybe even genuinely was being nice because it was februari and then may comes around or late April comes around and he's like, uh, I thought you were going to be skinnier kind of thing.

0:40:29 Lydia: Yeah and he's not happy yeah yeah totally it could be and you know we're kind kind of like closing out on the fat shaming stuff within the complaint. But I wanted to just touch on that meeting one more time with Ryan Reynolds, because in the attachment in Exhibit A, they have this line here. And I just want to call this out. In this meeting where Baldoni was aggressively confronted by Reynolds and Lively, Lively told Baldoni that if he could not get on board with how she works, quote, he still had two weeks to recast her. There is no way that she said that with regard to how she worked. Like basically saying like, if you can't deal with my husband been cussing you out.

0:41:05 Lydia: You still have two weeks to get rid of me. There's no way. When I read that, I was like, the only part that's quoted there is he still had two weeks to recast her. What a reasonable person would interpret that to be is what she likely said was like hey, if you're not happy with how this is working out.

0:41:10 Thomas: He's thought, yeah. Yeah. You got a problem with my body.

0:41:18 Lydia: Yeah, exactly. If I'm not fitting your vision, you still have two week to figure this out. Like you don't have to keep going with me if I'm what you need for this film, for this project, which is a completely reasonable thing to say. I mean, obviously it would hurt to hear the answer to that potentially, but there's no No way. There's no way it's about how she works. And if he couldn't get on board with it, then go ahead and recast me.

0:41:38 Thomas: And the complaint does that in paragraph 51, the one we're on. Lively then delivered an ultimatum. If Baldoni could not get on board with her work methods, he still had two weeks to recast her. And even in his telling of the story, that doesn't make any sense. If it's like she misinterpreted this thing and apparently Dawn did, and apparently Ryan Reynolds did, weird. Weird. She misinterpreted this to be a fat shaming thing. And this is in the conversation where he's getting yelled at for that. Even if he's telling the truth, it doesn't make any sense that she would be like, do you need to work with my methods or you can recast? It doesn't make any sens. Like it way more fits to imagine that she's like, Hey, if you have a problem with me and how I look, instead of going behind my back, essentially, like you can recap me and note, he could recast her. If you're already going to be talking about how big of a problem she was and she's taking control. Now, again, this is a few days before the other things, The other texts that are like, oh, she's going to direct the film. So this is a few days before that, but he could just recast her.

0:42:29 Lydia: Well but I mean like so April 20th within the complaint he characterizes this as an ultimatum and a threat to destroy his reputation and career.

0:42:34 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, yeah, sure. We should read the next paragraph.

0:42:39 Lydia: Implicit in this ultimatium was a threat to destroy Baldoni's reputation and career.

0:42:42 Thomas: No. Where? Where? Not even in your own complaint. Is that true?

0:42:44 Lydia: Yeah as lively well knew Baldoni has worked hard throughout his career to earn and deserve a a reputation based on his passionate advocacy for women's rights, a reputation she would later exploit and weaponize against him. If Lively were to back out of the film, especially based on accusations of fat shaming, Baldoni's reputation and life's work would be left in tatters. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

0:43:05 Thomas: Oh, isn't that interesting? This is him acknowledging she would be backing out of the film because of fat shaming and not get with my methods. So even his own complaint is lying about what her reasoning is here. And it's very clear because the reasoning he says doesn't make sense. It's funny that he says implicit in this ultimatum because it'd be one thing if he were to claim that she actively threatened him and there's no evidence, you know, and he just like put quotes like, oh, she said this, or even if he said she told him she would go to the press or something, that would be one think because we couldn't entirely argue that like it would have to be like, well, he said, she says, but the fact that he doesn't even do that and just says implicit, implicit in the ultimatums. Then I feel like we kind of have most all the information then, because if you're saying it was an implied kind of threat in what, what words implied that in any way, like you didn't demonstrate that. You know what I mean? Like it'd be one thing if he just made that claim that she said that she threatened that is another to be like, well, here's what she said. And you know, we, but we all know that she was implying it would destroy my career. It's like, what do we know that I don't get that at all.

0:44:08 Thomas: That's not anything I get from this.

0:44:09 Lydia: So he says he had no choice but to bow to Lively and Reynolds' demands.

0:44:19 Ad: [Ad break 3 — ad music]

0:44:20 Thomas: And that is where we're going to leave it for episode 40. So moving along, moving along.

0:44:25 Lydia: Yeah, slow and steady.

0:44:26 Thomas: Checking in. How are you doing?

0:44:27 Lydia: I'm hanging in there. I know we're going to get through this together, but

0:44:31 Thomas: Do you because I don't know

0:44:32 Lydia: I have to be optimistic, I think.

0:44:34 Thomas: Yeah you need one in every couple

0:44:37 Lydia: Exactly. Exactly. And I'm that person and I can own that. And that's fine.

0:44:39 Thomas: And my view is we will die before we finish this yeah yeah or just you know a meteor could hit at some point doesn't have to be like old age yeah well god willing yeah I've been rooting for the meteor since 2017 I think he's fine fine you know I think he's fine yeah he just he because he's not on reddit you

0:44:43 Lydia: We'll send the kids off to college. Yeah.

0:44:49 Lydia: Just take out everybody. Yeah. Maybe that's for the best. Is this like what Judge Lyman's hoping for, too? Like maybe you think so? That's true.

0:45:05 Thomas: Know he just has to make decisions that are in front of him and they're pretty easy

0:45:08 Lydia: Maybe the law clerks are the ones that like are also rooting for the meteor because they've like they've had enough.

0:45:12 Thomas: I will say anyone who has to read through this whole complaint deserves you to go to patreon .com slash judge lyman no slash uh where there's woke by the way um slash uh gavel uh slash gavel pod I pulled an eli bosnick I was saying anyone who reads through this they deserve for you to go to patreon .com slash where there's folk what's wrong with

0:45:23 Lydia: No, not where there's wooks. Oh, man. Yeah. It's a perfectly fine place to go. Yeah.

0:45:39 Thomas: That just anyone yeah exactly what I intended to say anyway normies I know it's been so long since we last spoke that's on us it's because this complaint is killing us and we're trying to do it in a certain way and it's not working so we're trying a different way but anyway point is had you been on patreon.com slash gavelpod that's this quite a long time ago. Quite a long, yeah. Gavelpod.

0:45:59 Lydia: G -A -V -E -L -P -O -D. There's no additional A's or U's despite how Thomas just pronounced it.

0:46:10 Thomas: Pod.

0:46:10 Lydia: People are going to end up in the weirdest of places.

0:46:13 Thomas: Yeah. It's all right. I'll have to make a bunch of different like dummy Patreons just in case. Yeah, that's where you would have heard this an embarrassingly long time before. So, you know, I just gotta be there. Gotta be over there on the Patreoms. Let's see. What can we expect in the future? Next episode, Blake Blake Lively's plot really gets going.

0:46:18 Lydia: We're going to talk about it. Yeah. Yeah, of course.

0:46:31 Thomas: You know, her diabolical scheme. We'll see.

0:46:34 Lydia: And I think also a text that I found to be very clarifying about what the behind the scenes actually might have looked like from a non -wayfarer party. So excited to dig into that more.

0:46:47 Thomas: All right. Well, looking forward to that in episode 41. So for Thomas and Lydia here at Gavel Gavel, we'll see you next time. Yeah. At whatever show we happen to be on. Good night.

0:46:53 Lydia: That gavel woke. Where there's gavel. Jack off motion.