Ryan Reynolds made a thinly-veiled dig at Justin Baldoni and called that the substantial backlash that he and his canceled second wife Blake Lively have suffered amid their legal war against the 41-year-old It Ends With Us director as ‘meaningless.’
‘I can read something that says, “He should be drawn and quartered.” I could read something that says I should win a Nobel Prize. Both are meaningless,’ the Canadian 48-year-old scoffed in his TIME100 cover story Thursday.
‘None of us are comprised of our best moments. None of us are defined by our worst moments. We are something in the middle.’
Ryan’s production company and marketing firm Maximum Effort was honored by the magazine for being one of ‘the 100 most influential companies,’ but he doesn’t feel like his business has been badly impacted by the lawsuits.
‘Accessibility and accountability are a big part of how I do things,’ Reynolds noted.
‘The people that I work with know me, so there’s never a question of anything like that. If you operate with some degree of core values and integrity, they’re going to help you up. If you’re an a**hole, they’re not. And that’s pretty simple.’
Ryan Reynolds made a thinly-veiled dig at Justin Baldoni and called that the substantial backlash that he and his canceled second wife Blake Lively have suffered amid their legal war against the 41-year-old It Ends With Us director as ‘meaningless’ (pictured April 23)
The self-described ‘people pleaser’ stressed that his self-worth ‘comes from having four kids and a good marriage’ and nothing else ‘that isn’t under the roof of my home.’
Ryan had called Justin a ‘sexual predator’ because his 37-year-old wife alleged she was sexually harassed by him on the set of It Ends with Us in the complaint she filed with the California Civil Rights Department complaint on December 20.
But New York Times reporter Megan Twohey – who wrote Blake’s exposé last December – told NPR‘s Ari Shapiro last December that Baldoni’s alleged sexual harassment against her wasn’t that severe.
‘[Blake] told me, like, “Listen. This was actually not the worst that I have experienced in Hollywood. I’ve actually experienced far worse misconduct. You know, I spoke up because I wanted to address it, and I thought that I had, and I never had any intentions of discussing this or going public with my accusations,”‘ Twohey said.
On June 9, federal Judge Lewis J. Liman dismissed Justin and his Wayfarer Studios parties’ $400M countersuit against Reynolds, Lively, and her publicist Leslie Sloane alleging civil extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy.
Liman also dismissed Baldoni’s $250M defamation lawsuit against the NY Times for its biased coverage of of the Another Simple Favor star’s CRD complaint and text messages taken from Baldoni’s publicist Jennifer Abel.
The Canadian 48-year-old scoffed in his TIME100 cover story Thursday: ‘I can read something that says, “He should be drawn and quartered.” I could read something that says I should win a Nobel Prize. Both are meaningless’
He continued: ‘None of us are comprised of our best moments. None of us are defined by our worst moments. We are something in the middle’ (pictured May 18 with Blake Lively)
Ryan’s production company and marketing firm Maximum Effort was honored by the magazine for being one of ‘the 100 most influential companies,’ but he doesn’t feel like his business has been badly impacted by the lawsuits
Reynolds noted: ‘The people that I work with know me, so there’s never a question of anything like that. If you operate with some degree of core values and integrity, they’re going to help you up. If you’re an a**hole, they’re not. And that’s pretty simple’ (pictured April 29)
The self-described ‘people pleaser’ stressed that his self-worth ‘comes from having four kids and a good marriage’ and nothing else ‘that isn’t under the roof of my home’ (pictured April 24)
Abel’s text messages were obtained legally, while underhandedly, by Stephanie Jones via a subpoena from Vanzan Inc. – a shell company believed to be owned by Ryan and Blake (named after their hometowns of Vancouver and Tarzana).
All of the details behind the elusive subpoena will no doubt be explored at Lively’s defamation trial scheduled for March 2026 against Justin and his PR team for his ‘plan’ to undermine her reputation in retaliation with an online smear campaign.
Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman missed Monday’s deadline to amend four of their seven original claims against the Gossip Girl alum, who has already declared victory.
‘The Court’s decision on the motion to dismiss has no effect whatsoever on the truth that there was no harassment nor any smear campaign, and it does not in any way affect our vigorous defense against Ms. Lively’s claims,’ Freedman said in a statement Tuesday.
‘Discovery is proceeding and we are confident that we will prevail against these factually baseless accusations. Instead of revising the existing claims, our clients will be pursuing additional legal options that are available to us.’
Behind the scenes, none of the major talk show hosts – Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver – have cracked a joke about the Lively-Baldoni case after Reynolds’ company Mint Mobile was one of two sponsors for their 2023 podcast, Strike Force Five.
The Kwantlen Polytechnic University drop-out – who sold Mint Mobile to T-Mobile for $1.35B in 2023 – co-owns or has sold companies valued at over $14B, and Forbes ranked him the second highest earning actor of 2024 with $85M.
Ryan had called Justin a ‘sexual predator’ because his 37-year-old wife alleged she was sexually harassed by him on the set of It Ends with Us in the complaint she filed with the California Civil Rights Department complaint on December 20 (pictured in 2024)
On June 9, federal Judge Lewis J. Liman dismissed Justin and his Wayfarer Studios parties’ $400M countersuit against Reynolds, Lively, and her publicist Leslie Sloane alleging civil extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy (pictured December 9)
Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman (pictured May 9) missed Monday’s deadline to amend four of their seven original claims against the Gossip Girl alum, who has already declared victory
Behind the scenes, none of the major talk show hosts – Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver – have cracked a joke about the Lively-Baldoni case after Reynolds’ company Mint Mobile was one of two sponsors for their 2023 podcast, Strike Force Five (pictured in 2023)
The Kwantlen Polytechnic University drop-out – who sold Mint Mobile to T-Mobile for $1.35B in 2023 – co-owns or has sold companies valued at over $14B, and Forbes ranked him the second highest earning actor of 2024 with $85M (pictured May 6)
Ryan produced I Like Me, Colin Hanks’ fully-authorized documentary on the late Canadian comedian John Candy, which premieres September 4 at the Toronto Film Festival before streaming this fall on Amazon Prime Video.
Reynolds produced and stars in Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley’s US Navy film Mayday -premiering September 19 on Apple TV+ – alongside Kenneth Branagh and Maria Bakalova.
The Deadpool & Wolverine producer-star has a mystery role in Peter Atencio’s live action/animated comedy Animal Friends, which hits UK theaters October 10 and US theaters May 1, 2026.
Ryan is also currently ‘writing a little something right now that is an ensemble’ film for his wisecracking mercenary character.
