Justin Baldoni admitted he was “exhausted” from a year of “emotional stress”ahead of his legal battle with his “It Ends With Us” co-star Blake Lively.
In Monday’s episode of the “Gent’s Talk” podcast, which was recorded in November 2024, the director recalled vulnerably messaging his best friend and the president of his production company, Wayfarer Studios, to tell them about his “anxiety” and burnout.
“I told them that I wasn’t in the best place. I told them that I was exhausted, that I haven’t given myself time to recover or time to heal. I had an intense year — a lot of material success and a lot of emotional stress. It was very hard on me and my family,” he said.
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8 Baldoni, 41, shared that he was “having some anxiety,” struggling with sleeping and was not feeling like his “full self.”
The “Jane the Virgin” alum explained that he wears “a lot of hats” because he enjoys his job and the production company he has built.
“I love the people who work for us. I love the movies we make,” he added. “I love the impact we have, and yet, sometimes it’s easy to … fall back into our programming and be swept away by the current of self and be kind of overtaken by the wave of success and opportunity.”
Elsewhere in the newly released interview, Baldoni briefly discussed falling short, acknowledging he was “a work in progress” but has always strived to be “radically sincere and authentic.”
“I can get lost in the same way that everybody gets lost, but healing isn’t linear,” he said.
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8 Baldoni wrapped filming “It Ends With Us” in early 2024 and began a press tour for the release in August, but fans were quick to point out that Lively, 37, did not do any interviews with him nor did they attend the premiere together.
The “Gossip Girl” star then filed a sexual harassment complaint against the actor in December that also accused him and his agents of running a smear campaign to ruin her reputation.
At the time, the New York Times covered the filing, which included shocking allegations that higher-ups working on “It Ends With Us” had to have an “all-hands” meeting to warn Baldoni not to show Lively “nude videos or images of women” and not to talk about her weight.
Later that month, the “A Simple Favor” star filed a formal lawsuit against the “Five Feet Apart” director for sexual harassment, retaliation, emotional distress and invasion of privacy, among other claims.
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8 Baldoni denied the allegations against him and also sued the Times for libel.
“The Times story relied almost entirely on Lively’s unverified and self-serving narrative, lifting it nearly verbatim while disregarding an abundance of evidence that contradicted her claims and exposed her true motives,” his lawsuit read.
The newspaper, however, defended its reporting, telling Page Six it was “based on a review of thousands of pages of original documents, including the text messages and emails that we quote accurately and at length in the article.”
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