Justin Baldoni has hired a crisis PR veteran amid reports of a feud with Blake Lively and the rest of his “It Ends With Us” cast.
The 40-year-old “Jane the Virgin” alum, who starred in and directed the adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s 2016 novel, hired The Agency Group founder Melissa Nathan, according to Us Weekly.
The firm, which launched this summer, “redefines the rules of reputation management,” which means “more than just creating a powerful narrative — it’s knowing how to navigate that narrative,” according to its site.
Early Wednesday, production sources told TMZ that much of the crew sides with Baldoni, especially after they say Lively, 36, hired her own editor for the film and commissioned husband Ryan Reynolds to do last-minute rewrites.
Lively, who also produced, revealed last week that the “Deadpool & Wolverine” star secretly wrote part of the romance’s rooftop scene, which surprised screenwriter Christy Hall, who said she’d believed the changes to be improvised.
Chatter surrounding a rift between Baldoni, Lively and the main cast — including Jenny Slate, Brandon Sklenar, Hasan Minhaj, Isabela Ferrer and Alex Neustaedter — has long been circulating, but ramped up when he posed apart from the actors during the film’s New York premiere last week. Baldoni spent much of the press tour flying solo while the rest of the cast posed together on the red carpet and was regularly interviewed together.
“There is much more to this story,” an insider told People this week, noting the actors and Hoover “will have nothing to do with” Baldoni.
When asked about working with the “Five Feet Apart” filmmaker, 42-year-old Slate appeared to dodge the question — noting that watching Baldoni juggle acting and directing made her realize she’s “good with just acting.”
Baldoni alluded to “friction” on set in an interview published last week by Elle UK.
“There’s always friction that happens when you make a movie like this,” he said of the film, which deals in domestic violence. “Then at the end of the day, it’s that friction, I believe, that creates the beautiful art.”
At the premiere, Baldoni told Entertainment Tonight that Lively “is ready to direct” and should consider doing so for the sequel.
While some outlets have reported Baldoni made Lively uncomfortable on set, insiders told The Hollywood Reporter that post-production tensions ended with two different cuts of the film, which social media surmised meant Lively and Reynolds took over the film.
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