In Blake Lively’s bombshell sexual harassment complaint against Justin Baldoni, the fixers are now part of the problem.
On top of the laundry list of accused misconduct on the set of the film “It Ends with Us,” Lively’s surprise weekend filing against her director and costar Baldoni lays bare a show business process that’s meant to operate in the shadows – the hiring of expensive crisis communications experts to sway opinion and uplift clients.
Attorneys for Lively obtained numerous text messages between Baldoni’s personal rep Jennifer Abel and the crisis team he retained this summer, led by Melissa Nathan. Documents and texts said Baldoni did so to prepare for a scenario where Lively would come forward with accusations from the set, as well as narratives that key cast members were distancing themselves from Baldoni during the promotion of the Sony Pictures release. The exchanges reveal candid – or “cringeworthy,” as one competing crisis expert told Variety – efforts to counter Lively by enlisting friendly journalists and allegedly hiring a digital whiz to fabricate and amplify unflattering content about her.
Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman blasted the claims and supporting documents, like text messages and a multi-page strategy, as “cherry-picked” to build a narrative that forgoes crucial context and, in what would be important for Baldoni in this case, inaction in coming after Lively. While the complaint is under investigation by Freedman, the attorney said he is confident the full picture will reveal “nothing untoward happened” when it comes to Lively and Baldoni’s team — and that “reputation management,” as its commonly referred to in the digital lives of celebrities, is routine for countless public personalities.
This weekend, Abel addressed the Lively complaint in a private Facebook group for PR and marketing professionals. The post, verified by Variety, said that texts and documents obtained did not intend to smear the actress. “No negative press was ever facilitated, no social combat plan, although we were prepared for it, as it’s our job to be ready for any scenario, but we didn’t have to implement anything, because the internet was doing the work for us,” Abel wrote.
In a statement, Freedman added that Nathan “operated as any other crisis management firm would when hired by a client experiencing threats by two extremely powerful people with unlimited resources,” referring to Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds. “The standard scenario planning TAG PR drafted proved unnecessary as audiences found Lively’s own actions, interviews and marketing during the promotional tour distasteful, and responded organically to that which the media themselves picked up on.”
Some power players were dismayed by the tough tactics being floated by Abel and Nathan to “smear” Lively. Nathan pitched a four-month battle plan with a $175,000 price tag to “start threads of theories” on platforms like Reddit and TikTok in Baldoni’s favor, and to create “social fan engagement to go back and forth with any negative accounts, helping to change [sic] narrative and stay on track,” Lively’s complaint said. There was also the contracting of Jed Wallace, operator of a firm called Street Relations. One source described him as a “Ray Donovan” type fixer employed by powerful people. Freedman, who knows Wallace well, said he would not describe him as a fixer but rather someone with deep resources for unusual circumstances (he knows how to get a chopper for medical evacuation in remote parts of Italy, for instance).
Lively’s complaint filed with the California Civil Rights Department said Wallace weaponized “a digital army around the country from New York to Los Angeles to create, seed, and promote content that appeared to be authentic.” While the suit does not specify which stories might have targeted Lively, numerous unflattering pieces about the actress were resurfaced during the press tour for “It Ends with Us.” They included problematic past comments about the trans community (using the phrase “trannies”), and an attempted lifestyle brand launch in which Lively promoted the “allure” of an Antebellum South aesthetic.
Most importantly, Nathan stressed in early days, these efforts would be “untraceable.” Not anymore.
“It’s quite common for crisis people to be reactive, to monitor and respond to situations,” said one veteran media broker who has hired crisis firms on behalf of clients. “But to stage this entire campaign? To put this in writing?”
The source added that “fix-it shops usually employ some cyber warriors who come in to manage chatter, but it’s an unwritten code that you will not hire companies or social media agitators to go out and script a new narrative.”
Crisis PR is common in many sectors for individuals, corporations and political parties. What has industry insiders aghast over this conflict is the nature of the correspondence.
“You know we can bury anyone,” Nathan wrote to Abel in a February text cited in the complaint, ironically in an exchange about how she could not put such things in writing to Baldoni. The quote wound up in a New York Times headline. In an early Monday statement, Freedman said it was “ironic that the New York Times, through their effort to ‘uncover’ an insidious PR effort, played directly into the hands of Lively’s own dubious PR tactics by publishing leaked personal text exchanges that lack critical context – the very same tactics she’s accusing the firm of implementing.”
Some PR pros were empathetic to Abel and Nathan, given the unusual disclosure of private texts and documents which were likely subject to nondisclosure agreements.
“There are two smear campaigns going on here,” said one top studio executive. “One against Lively, and one against the PR people. It doesn’t mean that Jen Abel and Melissa Nathan didn’t do anything wrong, but who sold them out? There’s a code you don’t breach.” Another industry figure frequently involved in high profile conflicts said, “That’s crisis PR talk, right? Everybody talks like that. Everybody loves to talk a big game.”
The severity of the proposed campaign against Lively has led to some questions about how actionable these kinds of services could be in court.
“I think people might see what Baldoni did as at least unfair, if not harmful or possibly illegal in terms of further harassment or retaliation,” said Ryan Baker, co-founding partner of legal firm Waymaker LLP. “It puts this under a little more scrutiny, because all of these things clearly happened in a dynamic where Lively and Baldoni are going back and forth.”
Yet another highly sought after PR guru, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the sensational nature of the complaint is distracting from an industry reality.
“These days, all PR is crisis PR,” they said.