By The scandal surrounding the alleged smear campaign against Blake Lively by her “It Ends With Us” co-star and director Justin Baldoni is continuing to spiral with PR warfare and a new lawsuit now being leveled.
The most recent turn is that Baldoni’s former publicist and Jonesworks owner Steph Jones is suing him, his company Wayfarer Studios and his current publicity team which includes former Jonesworks publicist Jennifer Abel and crisis management expert Melissa Nathan.
Jones has reportedly accused Baldoni of breaching their contract. The suit also cites tortious interference with contract, breach of fiduciary duty and defamation from Abel and a number of others.
According to The New York Times and The Wrap which has obtained a copy of the suit, it’s claimed Abel and Nathan “secretly coordinated with Baldoni and Wayfarer to implement an aggressive media smear campaign against Baldoni’s film co-star [Lively], and then used the crisis as an opportunity to drive a wedge between Jones and Baldoni, and to publicly pin blame for this smear campaign on Jones – when Jones had no knowledge or involvement in it.”
Jones’ suit filed on Tuesday follows on from Lively filing a complaint on Saturday with the California Civil Rights Department, accusing Baldoni and his publicists of orchestrating negative coverage about her in retaliation for her complaints of sexual harassment on set.
A number of text messages and e-mails acquired via subpoena and reportedly tied to a company phone used by Abel before she left Jonesworks have been key evidence in the suits.
Following Lively’s suit, Baldoni was dropped by his agency WME while his podcast co-host announced she was quitting the show. Multiple people have come out in support of Lively in recent days with “It Ends With Us” studio Sony Pictures and SAG-AFTRA both issuing statements in support of her.
Sources: The New York Times, The Wrap, Nine News
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