Lively’s Case Against Baldoni gets Gutted by the Judge

The Lively v Wayfarer, et al trial was just a month and a half away when Lively’s case got gutted by the judge on April 2nd.

In Blake’s Amended Complaint filed on 2/18/25 against the Wayfarer Parties, there were 15 causes of action. Then, in her Second Amended Complaint, filed on 7/30/25, two of those causes of action were dropped by Lively, leaving 13 in place.

(The dropped causes were for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress against ten parties & Negligent Infliction of Emotional Distress against three parties.)

The remaining causes of action in that complaint were:

1- Sexual Harassment in Violation of Title VII against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

2- Retaliation in Violation of Title VII against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

3- Sexual Harassment in Violation of FEHA against It Ends With Us Movie LLC, Wayfarer, Baldoni, and Heath

4- Retaliation in Violation of FEHA against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

5- Retaliation in Violation of the CA Labor Code against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

6- Failure to Investigate, Prevents, and/or Remedy Harassment in Violation of FEHA against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

7- Aiding and Abetting Harassment & Retaliation in Violation of FEHA against Nathan, TAG, Abel, Wallace, and Street Relations

8- Breach of Contract – Actor Loan-out Agreement against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

9- Breach of Contract – Contract Rider Agreement against It Ends With Us Movie LLC and Wayfarer

10- False Light Invasion of Privacy against Wayfarer, Baldoni, Heath, Sarowitz, Nathan, TAG, Abel, Wallace, and Street Relations

11- Sexual Harassment in Violation of CA Civil Code against Baldoni and Heath

12- Defamation/Defamation Per Se against Wayfarer, Baldoni, and Heath

13- Civil Conspiracy against all Defendants

The Defendants (Wayfarer parties) filed motions for Judgement on the Pleadings (in September 2025) and for Summary Judgement (in November 2025).

The Judge in this case ruled on April 2, 2026, to dispose of 10 of Blake’s causes of action, leaving only three behind:

#4- Retaliation in Violation of FEHA against IEWUM and Wayfarer

#7- Aiding and Abetting Retaliation in Violation of FEHA against TAG

#9- Breach of the Contract Rider Agreement against IEWUM

This means Justin Baldoni, Jamey Heath, Steve Sarowitz, Jennifer Abel, and Melissa Nathan have all been released as defendants.

After this ruling there were two new dispositive motions put on the docket for Judge Liman to rule upon.

One motion was for Summary Judgment, filed by TAG (doc 1284).

The other was a motion for Judgment on the Pleadings filed by TAG regarding one cause of action and IEWUM and Wayfarer Studios regarding another cause of action (doc 1294).

On April 23, 2026, the judge denied TAG’s motion for Summary Judgment (doc 1374), leaving the other motion for Judgment on the Pleadings still open.

But then, a pre-trial conference was held on April 28th, and some interesting actions took place on the heels of that conference.

The very next day, on April 29th, the remaining Wayfarer parties in the case (Wayfarer Studios, IEWUM and TAG) made a stipulation “with respect to the protected activity element of Plaintiff’s Fourth Cause of Action for retaliation of California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (“FEHA”)” (doc 1422) that apparently sent Blake Lively’s attorneys into a tizzy.

The next day, on April 30th, Lively’s attorney requested leave to file a letter in response to Wayfarer’s stipulation (doc 1426)

But the judge quickly denied their request, stating he would hear from the parties following another hearing that was scheduled to take place the following Friday, May 8.

More documents were unsealed and made public on the docket over the weekend of May 1st, and there were some surprising revelations in text messages from Sony coupled with portions of Lively’s deposition that conflicted with Sony’s texts.

While news of this newly available-to-the-public started spreading across the Internet, Lively’s attorneys reportedly approached the Wayfarer attorneys seeking to settle these final three claims out of court.