During filming on It Ends With Us, Justin Baldoni attended what he thought would be a production meeting between himself and Blake Lively at Blake’s NYC apartment. He was surprised that Ryan Reynolds and Taylor Swift were also at the meeting, and that Taylor and Ryan seemed strangely insistent on using “Blake’s rewrites” on the IEWU script. Baldoni felt weird about the meeting, and after he left, Blake sent him text messages with an implied threat: that she is the Khaleesi and Ryan and Taylor are her protective “dragons.” Baldoni left Blake a voice memo soon after which came across as very defensive. All of this – the texts, the meeting, the voice memo – came out in all of the back-and-forth lawsuits and court-of-public-opinion jostling earlier this year.
Soon after the Khalessi text was released by Baldoni, we heard that Taylor Swift was pissed off at Blake, and she felt like Blake had been “leveraging” Taylor’s name and their friendship for a while. We also heard a few weeks ago that it was more than likely that Taylor would be subpoenaed for a deposition, at the very least, and that she would likely have to testify in court. Well, surprise! Taylor has been subpoenaed.
Taylor Swift has been subpoenaed as a witness in Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s ongoing legal battle over behind-the-scenes conflict on their movie It Ends with Us.
A spokesperson for Swift, 35, emphasized the singer has had no close connection to the film other than her song “My Tears Ricochet” being used, and that the subpoena is to create “tabloid clickbait.”
“Taylor Swift never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film, she did not even see It Ends With Us until weeks after its public release, and was traveling around the globe during 2023 and 2024 headlining the biggest tour in history,” a rep told PEOPLE.
“The connection Taylor had to this film was permitting the use of one song, ‘My Tears Ricochet.’ Given that her involvement was licensing a song for the film, which 19 other artists also did, this document subpoena is designed to use Taylor Swift’s name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case,” the spokesperson continued.
PEOPLE is out to attorneys for both Lively, 37, and Baldoni, 41, for comment.
Mmm, Taylor and her team are usually smarter than this. Keep in mind: Taylor wasn’t added as a co-defendant in Justin’s lawsuit. She’s not being sued – she was just subpoenaed because she has knowledge of a vital part of this case. There was a production meeting at Blake’s apartment and Taylor was present at the meeting and a witness to whatever happened at the meeting. According to Baldoni, Taylor wasn’t just a witness, she was actively involved in trying to convince Baldoni to use Blake’s rewrites. Something happened within the meeting which is a key element to both sides and it led to a flurry of texts and voice memos. Blake used Taylor, Taylor’s name and Taylor’s influence to pressure Baldoni to use certain “rewrites” and perhaps even more than that. During the promotion of IEWU, Blake and other people involved with the film could not keep Taylor’s name out of their mouths either – and all of that is on the record, and it will be part of the questioning for Taylor’s deposition.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
