Blake Lively has found herself trending on social media for the wrong reasons after the recent premiere of her new movie “It Ends With Us”.
The Hollywood actress has been facing a wave of backlash for the carefree way in which she responded to the film’s sensitive themes, which includes domestic violence, during the media tour.
This was in contrast to her co-star and movie director Justin Baldoni, who appeared to have taken a more in-touch approach.
In “It Ends With Us”, which is based on Colleen Hoover’s book best-selling book, the “Gossip Girl” star portrays Lily Bloom, a florist who falls in love with neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (Baldoni), and a toxic, abusive relationship forms.
The cast also includes Jenny Slate, Brandon Sklenar, Hasan Minhaj, Isabela Ferrer and Alex Neustaedter.
The drama over the movie and its cast continues to dominate social media. Fans have noticed that Lively took interviews separately from Baldoni and that he was taking care to discuss the sensitive subject matter of the film.
She seemed to brush off serious questions and used the opportunity to promote her own haircare line, Blake Brown, as well as her husband, Ryan Reynolds’s new film, “Deadpool & Wolverine”.
Rumours are also circulating about friction on set, with the cast unfollowing Baldoni on Instagram.
“Page Six” has since reported that Baldoni created an “extremely difficult” atmosphere behind the scenes for the entire cast and had made Lively feel “uncomfortable” during filming.
In addition,“TMZ” has said Lively believed Baldoni fat-shamed her on set by asking his trainer how much she weighed and how to avoid injuring his back when picking her up.
The publication also reported that she felt that the “Jane the Virgin” actor lingered too long during one of their kissing scenes.
But the “Hollywood Reporter” has stated that much of the conflict between the co-stars stemmed from “creative differences” as they reported that there “was a fracture among the film-makers in the post-production process, wherein two different cuts of the movie emerged”.
They added that a source close to Baldoni attributed the tension between them to “creative differences” that had been “overblown”. Lively “wants to direct the next movie, sidelining him and securing the rights from Colleen”.
Baldoni even implied during a recent interview that he would not be returning as a director for the sequel, “It Starts With Us”, and even suggested that Lively was “ready to direct”, which some fans interpreted as a snarky comment.
Baldoni has also reportedly hired crisis public relations guru Melissa Nathan, whose worked with Johnny Depp during the Amber Heard trial.
As the drama over the movie continues to unfold, Lively recently took to social media to seemingly quell tension by sharing resources for abuse survivors in an Instagram Story as well as posting a BBC interview where she explains that her character was more than just a “survivor” and a “victim”.