Blake Lively wins fees, not damages

Judge allows Blake Lively to recover legal fees from Justin Baldoni but rejects punitive damages and additional relief

Blake Lively can recover some legal costs from fellow actor and director Justin Baldoni but not punitive damages and other relief she sought after settling her legal claims over their 2024 film It Ends With Us, a judge has ruled. Judge Lewis J Liman said in a written decision on Friday that Lively can recover legal fees and costs related to her defence against a countersuit Baldoni brought against her after she sued him in December 2024.

In his written ruling Friday, Liman cited a California law designed to protect survivors of sexual harassment and discrimination from retaliatory lawsuits meant to intimidate and silence victims.

The judge said the law requires that the plaintiff must pay the defendant’s legal fees and costs if a defamation claim made in response to a lawsuit is dismissed, even if the facts of the case have not been developed through the gathering of evidence.

Liman said an exception would be if Baldoni and his production company, Wayfarer Studios LLC, could prove malice fuelled Lively’s claims, but that Baldoni and Wayfarer had produced no evidence to show that. The judge rejected her claims to triple any damages and pursue punitive damages as well under the California law, saying that they did not fall within “carefully crafted federal procedural rules designed to protect the rights of the parties.”