On April 2, 2026, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York granted summary judgment in favor of Shapiro Arato Bach clients Wayfarer Studios LLC, Justin Baldoni, and their co-defendants on ten of thirteen claims asserted by actress Blake Lively arising out of the production and promotion of the film It Ends With Us. Lively had alleged, among other things, sexual harassment and retaliation under Title VII and the California Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA), breach of contract, false light invasion of privacy, and defamation.
The Court dismissed Lively’s sexual harassment claims on multiple independent grounds. It held Lively was an independent contractor rather than an employee as a matter of law, precluding her Title VII and California Labor Code claims. It further held her FEHA and related state harassment claims lacked a sufficient territorial nexus to California, as the core of the alleged conduct occurred on set in New Jersey. The Court also dismissed Lively’s breach of contract claim, holding the agreement at issue was never validly formed because it was never executed by Lively and contained other express conditions precedent that were never satisfied. The Court further dismissed Lively’s false light claim because New York law, which does not recognize the tort, governed the dispute, and dismissed her defamation claim on the ground that all challenged statements by counsel were privileged as fair and true reports of judicial proceedings.
The Court’s ruling fully dismissed all claims asserted against Baldoni and four other individual defendants. Three claims presently remain for trial: Lively’s FEHA retaliation claim against the production entities, a related breach of contract claim, and an aiding and abetting claim against The Agency Group PR LLC, a PR company. In permitting those claims to go forward, however, the Court observed that many of Lively’s underlying allegations as to both harassment and retaliation were not actionable as a matter of law.
Partners Jonathan Bach and Alexandra Shapiro argued the summary judgment motion and co-authored the briefs, along with Alice Buttrick. Co-counsel Liner Freedman Taitelman & Cooley LLP briefed and argued a related motion for judgment on the pleadings. The Court’s opinion can be found here.
Media coverage of the opinion can be found here, here, and here.