Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni Refuse Court Mediation in Legal Drama

Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni are not interested in a court mediation program.

The legal teams representing each actor filed a joint letter to New York federal judge Lewis J. Liman, saying that they “agreed that settlement discussions would be premature” during a conference on January 30, according to Page Six.

Both parties also agreed that mediation and discovery protocols would be “inappropriate for this case.” Discovery protocols are used in employment-related cases to make the exchange of information between both parties more efficient and relevant to the case.

The letter noted that Lively, 37, plans to file an “amended complaint imminently,” per the outlet, and that both sides plan to file motions requesting the judge dismiss the other side’s claims.

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According to Page Six, Liman granted the motion for exemption from both mediation and discovery protocols on Thursday, and requested both sides prepare for trial to begin on March 9, 2026.

Their legal dispute stems from Lively and Baldoni’s 2024 romantic drama, It Ends With Us, which Baldoni also directed. Lively filed a lawsuit in December 2024 against Baldoni, 41, claiming sexual harassment emotional distress and more. Baldoni denied the allegations and filed a defamation suit for $400 million against Lively, her husband, Ryan Reynolds, and her publicist Leslie Sloane.

Earlier on Friday, Us Weekly confirmed that Lively’s team had subpoenaed the phone records of Baldoni as well as film producer Jamey Heath and Wayfarer Studios’ Steve Sarowitz in an attempt to find evidence of a smear campaign against the actress.

Baldoni’s lawyers have called Lively’s accusations “completely false, outrageous and intentionally salacious.”

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“This lawsuit is a legal action based on an overwhelming amount of untampered evidence detailing Blake Lively and her team’s duplicitous attempt to destroy Justin Baldoni, his team and their respective companies by disseminating grossly edited, unsubstantiated, new and doctored information to the media,” Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman said in a statement to Us.

Lively’s lawyers have also denied the claims against her, accusing Baldoni of taking from “another chapter of the abuser playbook.”

“This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim,” they told Us in a statement in January. “This is what experts call DARVO. Deny. Attack. Reverse Victim Offender.”

Lively’s team also accused Baldoni of using his lawsuit to deflect attention off of him and onto his costar.