Justin Baldoni’s Pac-Man movie is ‘in jeopardy’ as the ongoing legal battle against his It End With Us co-star, Blake Lively, intensifies. 

The filmmaker, 41 – whose case with the Gossip Girl alum is set to go to trial later next year on March 9 – was set to produce the upcoming project based on the popular video game under the development of his Wayfarer Studios. 

But last month on December 21, Lively accused Baldoni of Sєxual harᴀssment and launching a smear campaign against her in a bombshell lawsuit. 

Justin – who has since countersued both Blake and her husband Ryan Reynolds for a whopping sum of $400 million – was soon dropped from WME agency, as well as his Wayfarer Studios. 

Sources have now told The Hollywood Reporter that Baldoni has already ‘lost three jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars.’ 

Justin and his production company depended on WME to aid with packaging the film, and those currently partnered with Wayfarer are ‘having a conversation.’ 

Justin Baldoni’s, 41, Pac-Man movie is ‘in jeopardy’ as the ongoing legal battle against his It End With Us co-star, Blake Lively, intensifies; seen in 2023 in NYC 

Blake and Justin in a scene from their movie It Ends With Us

Wayfarer – which Justin founded with Steve Sarowitz – notably financed, developed and produced the adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel, It Ends With Us. 

The film was made on a budget of $25 million and was a box office success after raking in around $351 million in the global box office – with Baldoni and Lively taking on the leading roles in the movie. 

The company is adapting other books amid the lawsuit, such as Kirsty Greenwood’s The Love Of My Afterlife, per The Hollywood Reporter. 

Wayfarer has additional projects under its belt since being dropped from WME, including Eleanor The Great – which is Scarlet Johansson’s directorial debut.

The live-action Pac-Man movie based on the 1980 arcade game has been in development since 2022 from Bandai Namco Entertainment. Justin is currently set to be one of the film’s producers, despite its future in question. 

Meanwhile, Blake and her husband Ryan Reynolds are escalating their legal battle with her former co-star Baldoni by doubling down on their request for a gag order.

The actress, 37, and her partner, 46, argue Justin’s alleged behavior, both during filming and in the media campaign that followed the release of the It Ends With Us film has been improper – and they are now intent on stopping what they say is an ongoing smear campaign against Blake.

In a letter to Judge Lewis J. Liman, their attorney, Esra Hudson, reinforced the need for a protective order to prevent further ‘extrajudicial statements’ by Justin’s legal team.

Wayfarer – which Justin founded with Steve Sarowitz – notably financed, developed and produced the adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel, It Ends With Us

Meanwhile, Blake and her husband Ryan Reynolds are escalating their legal battle with her former co-star Baldoni by doubling down on their request for a gag order; Blake seen in August 2024 in NYC

ᴅᴇᴀᴅline reported that the letter said: ‘Requiring counsel to heed the ethical rules that bind them is not a gag order.’ 

‘It is a mechanism that would ensure the proceedings in this Court are not prejudiced by counsel’s conduct outside of the courtroom.’

Read More Blake Lively’s brother-in-law makes shock apology to Justin Baldoni

The request follows claims from Blake’s team that Justin and his ᴀssociates, including crisis PR executive Melissa Nathan, are running a deliberate campaign of media manipulation against her. 

Hudson added: ‘The retaliation campaign that Ms Lively alleged in her Complaint… includes highly destructive behind-the-scenes elements, including the regular engagement of Melissa Nathan with her vast tabloid media sources to influence a steady stream of negative media regarding Ms. Lively.’ 

The lawyer added the alleged campaign involved ‘a sophisticated and ‘untraceable’ digital social media manipulation campaign designed to impact social media algorithms.’

Earlier in the week, Justin’s attorney Kevin Fritz pushed back against the gag order, describing it as an overreach.

The dispute comes in the wake of a video released by the filmmaker’s team showing him and Blake during a scene on the It Ends With Us set. 

Blake’s team claims the video corroborates her allegations of harᴀssment, detailing moments where Justin allegedly touched her without consent during an unscripted scene.

The actress and her partner argue Justin’s alleged behavior, both during filming and in the media campaign that followed the release of the It Ends With Us film has been improper; seen in July 2024 in NYC

Earlier in the week, Justin’s attorney Kevin Fritz pushed back against the gag order, describing it as an overreach; seen in December 2024 in L.A. 

Her team said: ‘Justin Baldoni and his lawyer may hope that this latest stunt will get ahead of the damaging evidence against him, but the video itself is damning.’

Justin’s lawyer has dismissed these claims, maintaining his innocence and releasing the footage as evidence of professionalism on set. Judge Liman has yet to make a ruling on the gag order request.

This week, flirty text exchanges between Justin and Blake also surfaced in a DailyMail.com analysis from hundreds of pages of sparring legal filings. 

‘I feel the same. It’s such a good feeling to get work done that we’re proud of. And to do it together,’ Lively wrote tenderly to Baldoni in one such exchange. ‘It just clicks when we find it.’

It Ends With Us has spawned multiple lawsuits and contentious court filings that depict a confounding, love-hate relationship between its two biggest stars.

According to Baldoni’s version of events, his working relationship with Lively ‘grew close’ to the point where the two stars would text one another daily.

They ‘shared stories and pictures from their lives, commiserated over family illnesses and exchanged jokes and memes,’ his lawyers write.

The handsome actor-director and the wife of Hollywood megastar Ryan Reynolds enjoyed a ‘friendly banter’ and a ‘comfortable dynamic’ that should have made working together easy.

‘I like sentimental Blake,’ Baldoni replied text mentioned above, prompting Lively to joke: ‘Never met her.’

He quipped: ‘I also like a**hole Blake… don’t worry’. The Gossip Girl alum responded with self-deprecating humor, writing: ‘I’ve met her. So have my suppositories.’

Relations were similarly convivial in May 2023 on the eve of filming for their hit flick about a pretty young florist who falls in love with a charming but abusive neurosurgeon. 

This week, flirty text exchanges between Justin and Blake surfaced in a DailyMail.com analysis from hundreds of pages of sparring legal filings

‘I’m excited to start tomorrow. But it’s only one piece of the journey. We started months ago’, purred Lively. She met husband Reynolds on the set of Green Lantern months prior to his December 2010 divorce from Scarlett Johansson and married him two years later.

‘I’m grateful for all we’ve built so far. Thank you for caring so much and for putting every bit of you into showing it,’ she continued over email.

About a week later Baldoni, a married father-of-two, messaged Lively to say: ‘I’m not going to tell you that you were amazing because you tease me for being so sentimental – but you were amazing today.’

‘Thank you I do appreciate it. I’m just a ball buster but it means a lot to me. I care a great deal. And always want to deliver,’ Lively wrote back.

She gushed: ‘You were terrific. I’m proud of everything we did today, but really every day.’

But dueling lawsuits have since revealed how relations soured as Lively allegedly fought Baldoni for greater artistic control and started to feel uncomfortable during their intimate scenes.

She hired her own editor to produce her own version of the film independently of Baldoni and the pair reportedly declined to do press together.

Baldoni even claims that he and his family were forced to watch the premiere in a basement because Lively refused to be in the same room as him.

Lively was the first to sue, claiming in a California civil rights complaint that Baldoni entered her trailer while she was topless, showed her graphic video of his wife giving birth and bit and sucked on her lips during an improvised kissing scene.

She further accused him of conspiring to smear her reputation.

‘I feel the same. It’s such a good feeling to get work done that we’re proud of. And to do it together,’ Lively wrote tenderly to Baldoni in one such exchange. ‘It just clicks when we find it’; seen in December 2024 in NYC 

Baldoni sued Lively and Reynolds for defamation, turning the narrative on its head by claiming it was Lively’s team doing the smearing and asking for $400 million in damages; seen in 2019 

Her Sєxual harᴀssment claims made global headlines thanks to the near-simultaneous publication of a New York Times expose enтιтled ‘Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine’ which stretched to 4,000 words and quoted heavily from the complaint. 

Next came the counterpunch: Baldoni sued Lively and Reynolds for defamation, turning the narrative on its head by claiming it was Lively’s team doing the smearing and asking for $400 million in damages.

He accused her of twisting the meaning of his texts and emails and working in tandem with Leslie Sloane, a powerful Hollywood publicist, to plant damaging stories about him in the media.

It was all a ploy, Baldoni argued, to rebuild Lively’s reputation after she came in for criticism for being prickly and difficult in interviews and promotional events.

The feud took yet another explosive twist when DailyMail.com published previously unseen raw video footage of Baldoni and Lively filming a romantic dance scene as their characters Lily Bloom and Ryle Kincaid.

Lively’s suit alleges that Baldoni ‘leaned forward and slowly dragged his lips from her ear and down her neck as he said, it smells so good’ during the interaction.

It was all a ploy, Baldoni argued, to rebuild Lively’s reputation after she came in for criticism for being prickly and difficult in interviews and promotional events; seen in December 2024 in NYC 

In the footage obtained by DailyMail.com the pair are seen engaging in what appears to be playful but professional banter between takes. 

Baldoni’s lawyer Bryan Freedman flagged the footage as proof that his client behaved appropriately and had ‘nothing to hide.’ Lively countered that it confirmed her claims of harᴀssment. 

It was reported hours later that Lively and Reynolds had asked the court to slap a protective order on Baldoni’s lawyers to stop them making ‘harᴀssing and retaliatory’ comments to the media.

Sources close to Freedman say he’ll oppose the takedown because it’s ‘grossly unfair’ to bar Baldoni from putting his side in the public domain weeks after Lively used the New York Times to present hers.